


ABC TMNT II: Out Of The Ooze

by This_world_of_beautiful_monsters



Series: ABC TMNT [2]
Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (IDW Comics), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2012), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: 9/11 References, Aggression, Angst, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Live Dissection, M/M, Master/Slave, Mind Break, Non-Consensual Bondage, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Non-Consensual Touching, Other, Past Mind Control, People Eating, Rape Recovery, Self-Harm, Self-Loathing, Seppuku, Sexual Slavery, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, T-Cest, The Astral Plane, Thoughts of Infanticide, Torture, blood consumption, body issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:54:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 26
Words: 48,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27564859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/This_world_of_beautiful_monsters/pseuds/This_world_of_beautiful_monsters
Summary: Stories from various TMNT universes (none of which I own).
Relationships: Alopex/Raphael (TMNT), April O'Neil/Shinigami (TMNT), Casey Jones/Raphael (TMNT), Donatello/April O'Neil (TMNT), Donatello/Casey Jones (TMNT), Karai/Leonardo (TMNT), Leonardo/Raphael (TMNT), Michelangelo/Mondo Gecko (TMNT), Mona Lisa/Raphael (TMNT), Non-Consensual Pairings, Raphael/Spike | Slash (TMNT)
Series: ABC TMNT [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2013724
Comments: 34
Kudos: 77





	1. Acceptance

At first, Hamato Yoshi has a hard time accepting his new life.

At first, he _hates_ it.

He squats in a sewer pipe, trying not to choke on the scent of shit and vomit filling his sensitive new nose. He's frantically snipping at the fur covering his legs with a pair of scissors he found down here, dark clumps piling up around his feet. He barely notices when the blades pierce his skin--the fur is a terrible, suffocating mass covering him and he has to get it _off_ , no matter the cost.

The little green monsters are screaming again, their voices stabbing at his ears. He can't remember why he brought them with him, why he didn't smother them out of mercy or just leave them where they were. They're nothing more than twisted mistakes, mockeries of his beautiful Miwa.

"Shut up!" he screams in Japanese, slicing himself again. "Shut up! You're not fucking children, so acting like it!" They cry louder in response.

He hears a banging sound and glances over to see that one of the little freaks has curled up in its shell while the green-eyed one bangs on it like a drum. The smallest watches the spectacle with an idiot's grin, while the largest--the only one who can walk yet--tugs on the green-eyed one's arm, making little whines of protest.

"STOP IT!" Yoshi howls, hurling the scissors at them. It passes righter over the green-eyed one's head, burying itself in the wall, and he lurches backward with a startled squeak. Well, Yoshi thinks it's a he--he hasn't seen any genitals on the goddamn things. At least _his_ dick survived the transformation intact, even though almost nothing else did.

"Fuck," he moans, pressing his head against the cold wall. "Shit, I'm sorry." Whatever the fresh fuck these creatures are, they're obviously _young_ , and they haven't done anything to deserve this treatment.

 _Neither have I,_ he reminds himself. After all, hasn't he suffered enough for his sins? Hasn't he already lost his wife and daughter, a knife in the heart that he feels every second of every day? What has he done to deserve being transformed into a monster, cast into a literal underworld with these shrieking abominations?

He doesn't know. All he knows is that he's _drowning_ in this fur, and he's so _tired_ , and the awful tail is weighing him down, and even when he pinches his ears closed he can still hear the little monsters crying.

For a time he just lies there, trying to summon the energy to go get those scissors so he can ram them through his own throat. Then something pokes him, and Yoshi cracks his eyes open with a groan. _"What?"_

The biggest one is standing there, swaying uncertainly as it gazes at him with bright blue eyes. It babbles something incomprehensible and its stomach growls.

"You're hungry?" Yoshi asks. "I'm hungry, too. Hey, let's go get something to eat, how's that sound?" His voice rises, mocking and hysterical. "'Table for the buck-naked were-rat and four demon brats from hell, please.'" He scoffs. "There's no fucking food down here. Eat one of the other freaks."

The turtle pokes him again, babbles some more.

"You want me to feed you?" Yoshi laughs incredulously. "I can't take care of you! I can't fucking take of myself!" He spits on the ground. "You want to know what happened to the last child I had to take care of? Do you?" He leans closer, until their noses are touching. "She roasted alive in her own fucking house. Do you want that to happen to you? Is that it?"

Those blue eyes just stare at him, _focused_ in a way that creeps Yoshi out. "Get the fuck away from me," he snarls. Then, softer, "Please. I can't help you."

It keeps staring until Yoshi can't stand it anymore. He lurches to his feet, sending the creature tumbling back on its bottom with a little cry. "It'll be over soon," Yoshi mumbles, staggering to the scissors. "I'll end you before I do myself, huh? Is that nice?"

Something snags on his tail (Jesus fucking Christ, he still can't believe he has a tail), and he jerks to a stop. The green-eyed one has given up on tormenting its brothers to cling on to the tail for dear life, tiny muscles straining. "What the fuck do _you_ want?" Yoshi asks, exasperated.

The creature tilts its head for a second, emerald eyes narrowed as if considering the question. Then it sinks its sharp little gums into his tail.

" _SHIT!"_ Yoshi's tail twitches, mostly (but not entirely) on instinct, sending the little turtle flying into the wall with a sickening CRACK! It lets out a piercing shriek as it falls to the floor.

" _Shit!"_ Yoshi howls again, startled out of his funk by the terrible noise. He rushes to the creature's side, scissors forgotten, and drops to his knees. "Oh _God,_ oh...I'm so sorry..." The creature whimpers and curls in on itself, shivering. The others stagger or crawl to its side, letting high-pitched squeals. In a few seconds the small turtle's almost completely covered, but not before Yoshi can see the jagged crack in the front part of its shell.

"Wait!" Yoshi calls, tugging the others off as gently as he can, heedless of how they bite and claw at him. "Give him some air!" He scoops the small turtle to his chest, rocking it back and forth as it whimpers and moans. "I'm sorry," he whispers, tears streaming down his face. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."

They sob together, all five of them, before the creatures pass out with exhaustion. Yoshi stays awake long afterward, not sure why he's shaking. He'd literally been about to kill them all, hadn't he? Why does a little crack make him feel so ridiculously guilty?

When they wake up, the turtles start making those hungry little cries again, even the green-eyed one, who wriggles off his lap and refuses to be recaptured. The noise rises, until Yoshi's about to cover his ears again...but then he sees the clumps of algae on the wall.

"Here," he says, not sure what he's doing as he rips some down and passes it around. They seem to enjoy ripping into that, so he feeds it to them until the crying stops. Yoshi takes a few bites for himself, almost absentmindedly, and when it doesn't make him immediately vomit he eats some more.

They stay down there together for a few days, lapping dew off the walls in between algae snacks. When he finally starts to walk away, they crawl or toddle after him, and he ends up pulling them into his arms rather than be slowed down. He washes them off into a reservoir (probably unsanitary, but fuck NYC health officials, they should keep a better eye on the toxic chemicals floating around).

Eventually, he tries to take them to the surface, only to get chased back underground by men in suits. Yoshi can't help admitting that he's starting to feel more comfortable underground, even if it's only because of his hateful rat side. And, as he discovers the new skills his enhanced senses offer him while slowly getting used to his (regrown) fur, that side no longer feels quite so hateful.

The creatures, too...as he feeds them and sleeps near them, he finds himself occasionally thinking of them as "children." They start sleeping piled up against him, and after a while he stops pushing them away.

When he first gives them names, it's only as a means of getting them to listen to his commands and telling them apart in his head. The plan is to help them to figure out how to survive, maybe teach them a few ninja skills since they seem to be such talented mimics, then send them on their way. He doubts he'll ever feel anything for them beyond a dull obligation, and he can't imagine that they'd end up feeling even that much for him.

And then...then Yoshi wakes up one morning and realizes that he loves Michelangelo's endless generosity and good humor. He loves Donatello's bright, fascinated eyes, his endless questions and explorations. He loves Raphael's fierce determination and unquenchable desire to do what's right, he loves Leonardo's careful attention to training and how protective he is towards his brothers. And Yoshi especially loves how much they love him in return.

Acceptance, it seems, has snuck up on him.

They will never replace Tang Shen or Miwa (when Splinter does reunite with his biological daughter, he will know that Karai is nothing like what Miwa could have been, and that will always haunt their relationship) but they can still be a family. He can still protect them, take this second chance at a future and a legacy.

He tells them a story about the crack in Raphael's chest, and they never have any reason to doubt him. Yoshi knows that he did a truly terrible thing, but he also knows that if he tells his sons the truth and faces their judgement, it will tear their family apart. They need each other to survive, they always will, and he won't risk that out of a petty need for absolution.

It's one of many secrets that he takes to the grave, as is the way of parents.


	2. Beloved

Donatello Hamato loves April O'Neil. It's one of the inescapable facts of life, like "grass is green" or "Splinter likes cheese" or "Raph sometimes sleeps with a stuffed animal, but we can never ever mention it out loud."

When he sees her rise above the streets of New York City, eyes glowing and hair streaming above her head, he still loves her. He might love her more than he ever has before, because she has become so wonderfully different, so beautifully alien. She's a mutant, like him, and for the first time ever she actually looks like it. They could be outcasts from society together, maybe.

Donnie loves April while she's hoisting him into the air, the ground disappearing under his feet. He loves her when he begs desperately, hopelessly, for her to remember who she is and reject the terrible crystal. He loves her when Za-Naron whispers in his head, _You are nothing, you stupid little freak. You think we are alike now? You are not fit to worship at my feet._

And he loves her when she shreds him down to the atom, scattering him across the city. It's hell, a true taste of hell, it's worse than anything he ever imagined or dreamed possible, so much worse than what he described to his brothers.

As bits of him drift across the city, Donnie feels himself going completely insane. A raw pocket of madness is burned deep into his memory, to remain etched in his brain forever.

Through it all, he loves her.

When she brings him back to life, he wants to drop to his knees and kiss her feet. She brought him back from the dead, after all, the way only a goddess could. He wants to bathe her in adoration.

But he recognizes that that's probably leftover madness, so he contains himself while they bring April home and discuss the incident. He tells April that it's fine, everything is fine, and really it is. He forgives her. He knows she wasn't in control.

Before she leaves, he asks for her tanto, saying he wants to take samples from when it was used on Za-Naron. She agrees, why wouldn't she? Donatello Hamato loves April O'Neil, he would never do anything to hurt her.

That night, as his family sleeps, Donnie takes the tanto into his lab and hollows the hilt out.

Then he starts building a bomb.

It's a very small bomb, the exact weight and shape of the missing piece of sword hilt. He's quite proud of it, if he says so himself. There's an electronic link-up to an app he creates on his T-phone, just his. This app is voice activated if need be. The code word is "Scylla," the name of a beautiful nymph in Ancient Greece who was transformed into a terrible monster against her will.

When he gives the tanto back to April, she doesn't seem to think there's anything wrong. If she feels anything in his mind--she doesn't, he hopes she doesn't, she _promised_ to use her powers carefully--she doesn't say anything. Maybe she suspects, deep down, that this is necessary. He doesn't know if he wants to hope for that or not.

The tanto goes where it usually does, at the base of her spine. If she's wearing it when Donnie activates the bomb, it will tear her apart and kill her instantly. If she's wielding it, it might not kill her, but it will definitely disable her, especially since her powers seem focused in her hands.

However she's using it, if April loses control again, Donnie will not hesitate to take her down. He doesn't know if something like her can be brought down with sedatives or electroshocks. His only choice, really, was to create a permanent solution.

Donatello Hamato loves April O'Neil. But he loves his brothers even more. And he knows that if she's capable of doing such terrible things once, she is capable of doing it again. He will never let the people he loves experience what he has, not ever.

Even if it means ripping his own heart out in the process.


	3. Confrontation

Leo almost didn't knock on her door. Almost. But then he reminded himself that Kitsune probably knew he was there already, was no doubt smirking to herself as she wondered whether he'd have the guts to go in.

So he sucked in a breath and knocked. He supposed that he didn't have to knock, since she was a prisoner, but the last thing he wanted to do was walk in on her naked or using the bathroom or something. Did creatures like her even need to do that?

"Come in," said the soft, musical voice from his nightmares. She spoke in ancient Japanese, the language that Leo had used throughout his first life. She'd filled his head with that tongue, and the reverberations had almost broken his sanity for good.

Leo slipped inside and found her kneeling over a pot of tea, kimono as pristine as ever and black hair glinting in the overhead light. She was beautiful, just as Karai was beautiful, and even Saki. They were a beautiful, deadly family and once upon a time he'd been their ugly little pet without realizing it.

"Good evening, _chunin,"_ she said, bowing her head demurely. "This is a very pleasant surprise. Come, sit."

He sat in perfect seiza, even though every nerve in his body would screaming at him to run. "I met a man in the sewers, called the Rat King," he began, watching her pour them tea so he wouldn't have to look in her eyes. "He claimed to be your brother, that you were part of some sort of family waging a 'game' for the fate of the world. I want to know if he was telling the truth, and--"

She chuckled to herself as she set the teapot aside. "That's not why you're here, little _chunin."_

Leo stared at her. "Excuse me?"

Kitsune lifted the tea to her lips, blowing on it gently. "You are curious about that, yes. And in answer to your question, Ratty dearest _believed_ he was telling the truth, although I'm not sure if it really counts as a game when the others playing have so small a chance of winning. But for the most part..."

Suddenly he was pinned in place by her dark, hungry gaze. "...You're here to see if you can confront your monster. If you can face the big, bad witch and walk away with your mind intact, without any help from your brothers or your ghosts." And his heart sank, because she was telling the truth.

Leo forced himself to look back, to not run for the door as fast as he could. "You can't get inside my head anymore," he said firmly, willing it to be true. "If you could, you would have made me kill my father long ago."

She shrugged, sipping her tea. "I don't need to read your mind, _chunin._ I already turned your soul inside out and shook out all the nasty bits you hide from everyone, even yourself. You're a boy who needs to face his demons, in order to delude yourself into believing you don't fear them anymore."

"I'm not afraid of you," Leo said, willing it to be true.

Kitsune just smiled. "Didn't your mother tell you not to lie? I'd assumed that she was around long enough to impart that much, at least."

The words made Leo shatter a little inside, but he summoned all the self-control he'd mastered in Shredder's court to raise an eyebrow. "Seriously? I thought immortals were supposed to be above such cheap shots."

Kitsune blinked. "Interesting reaction," she said, a note of approval creeping into her voice which Leo firmly told himself not to appreciate. "Raphael would probably have tried to strangle me for that remark. Then again," she took a thoughtful sip, "All three of your brothers would have been driven insane by this point, anyway."

Leo tensed. "You don't know that. You weren't in _their_ minds."

She nodded. "No, I wasn't. I only know what you think about them. And you think that Donatello's rigid worship of logic, Michelangelo's childishness, and Raphael's already-battered mental state would have been destroyed by conditioning as...elaborate as what I gave you."

"You're wrong," he said, fighting so very hard to keep his voice calm and neat. _Breathe, breathe. You're not scared of her. You know you're not._ He forced himself to lean forward slightly, growling, "I think it'd be best if we stopped talking about my brothers now."

Kitsune bowed her head. "Of course, _chunin,_ " she replied, her voice dripping with mocking respect. "I'm not a fool. I know what you would do to me if I harmed so much as a scale on your brothers' heads." Her smile grew broader, as if preparing to rip his throat out. "I wouldn't want to end up like Kraang or Slash, would I?" She shuddered dramatically. "Ugly business."

Leo scoffed. "What do you mean, _saw?_ You created that illusion."

"No." She shook her head, hair rustling against her back. "Like I said, I found all the nasty bits that were already in your soul, and I built a fantasy from them. It's not my fault that--"

"A _fantasy?!"_ Leo felt the rage spurting out of him, knows that he needs to back down before he makes himself vulnerable, but he couldn't stop. "My father tried to _kill_ me, I saw my brothers _burn alive_ , I had to fight their walking _corpses._ That wasn't a fantasy, that was _hell_ , and you put me through it for _no reason."_

She nodded approvingly. "There it is. That fury. You lock it away, play the role of the sweet, loyal little boy to the hilt, but deep down...you wanted to kill Slash and Kraang, long before I got involved. As for your father..." she shrugged. "You may not have wanted him dead, but you were angry, weren't you? All you wanted to do was protect your family, to be a better warrior, to be _strong_ for them, and all he felt like doing was suffocating and demeaning you. Not to mention that little trick with the mask."

Leo wanted to protest, but...but he _had_ wanted to kill Slash and Kraang for threatening his family, just a little, even if he'd immediately hated himself for it. As for his father--yes, he had been angry about the mask. He'd been _furious._ Instead of just _explaining_ how to improve their fighting techniques, Splinter had decided to chase them through the city in a ridiculous costume, mocking and hurting them. When the deception had been revealed, Leo had been so upset and humiliated he wanted to scream.

But he hadn't, just as he hadn't lingered too long on wanting to kill Slash and Kraang. He'd locked all those feelings away, and Kitsune had taken advantage.

"You hurt me," he said, trying and failing to make himself look up at her. "Whatever I was feeling, you twisted up until it was all wrong, you made me a _slave_. I did terrible things and you made me _enjoy_ them." He sucked in a breath. "It was a _violation._ I didn't want _any_ of it."

"I never said you wanted it," Kitsune replied mildly, taking a sip. "But you already had demons; all I had to do was give them a face." She jerked her head at Leo's cup. "Drink your tea, _chunin_ , it's getting cold."

Leo shook his head. "I'm not in the mood," he said, straightening his back and fisting his hands on his thighs in an attempt to keep them from shaking.

"Really? That's a pity. You used to love my tea, remember?"

Oh yes, he did. He remembered all those "sessions," letting her poke around in his mind with her powers and her words. He remembered spilling his soul to her willingly, even eagerly. He remembered breaking down and sobbing into her robe about his "lost" brothers, how she'd stroked his head and told him that they were looking down at him with pride.

If he drank the tea, he would vomit. He might vomit anyway.

"I'm not a killer," he reminded her. "I had a chance to kill Koya and I didn't. You couldn't make me take lives."

She nodded. "Yes, I didn't want to make you kill right away. Your moral code was buried so deep that it would have taken time and effort to dig it out, and if I pulled too fast I might have broken you to the point of uselessness. If I had had more time..." Her expression turned thoughtful. "We'll never know.

"But as for Koya--tell me. Did you spare that winged ninny's life because you thought was the right thing to do, or because you were scared of falling back into the dark? That if you followed through on one vision, the rest might come true?"

Leo rolled his eyes. "What kind of a question is that?"

"The kind that you're choosing to answer, because you can't bring yourself to flee." She took a long drink, eyes sparkling with amusement.

"I spared her life because it was the right thing to do." He hoped that was the answer, anyway. He needed it to be.

"And mutilating her, later, was that the right thing to do?"

He winced at the memory, at the red film over his eyes and Koya's screams of pain and horror. "I did what was necessary. You looked into my head, you know that I don't enjoy other's pain, no matter how much I hate them."

"Yes." Kitsune looked him up and down. "A good little soldier, whether you're in blue or black." She smirked. "Does it give you deja vu, being back here again? Kneeling before your master's throne, having an army of ninja at your beck and call once more?"

"I don't kneel before Splinter," Leo pointed out.

"Not physically, no. But I'm sure it bothers you to see him on that throne."

"No, you're not. You haven't had access to my mind in ages, remember?" He was glad she hadn't, because there had been a few mornings where he'd woken up in Foot headquarters and briefly forgot what color mask he was supposed to be wearing. Just a few mornings.

Kitsune nodded. "I'm not sure--not yet. But I know it bothers Michelangelo; that was quite a little display he pulled on the roof, by that way. Do you think you would have the courage to pull that off, if the need ever arose?"

Leo stared. "Are you....are you trying to turn me against my father? Again?"

"Of course not," Kitsune said, wrinkling her face up in disgust. "I'd never be that unsubtle. I'm just...curious. I'm always interested in the potential aftereffects of my work, especially in a case as...peculiar as yours."

"Is that why you're still here, then? Curiosity?"

Kitsune blinked. "I'm here because I've been incarcerated to await your father's righteous justice," she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Oh, please," Leo snarled. "When I was yours I would have set myself on fire if you asked me to. You could ask the ninja here to let you go and they'd do it in a heartbeat."

Kitsune shrugged. "Perhaps I want to watch your family tear itself apart under the weight of Shredder's throne. Perhaps I have some dastardly plan you'll never figure out until it's too late. Perhaps I simply don't have anything better to do. Try as you might, you can't get into my head, little _chunin,_ and you don't know the landscape there nearly as well as I do yours." 

Her eyes darted to his swords. "But if I _did_ try to escape, would you be able to stop me?" A finger reached for his forehead, and Leo flinched away before he could stop himself. She smirked. "If I asked you to lead me out of here, right now, could you resist?"

Leo's heat skipped a beat. _Do not panic she's bluffing do not panic she's bluffing do not panic please let her be bluffing._ "If I ever feel you in my head again, just a whisper," he said quietly. "I'll kill you. I won't hesitate like I did with Koya." He forced himself to look directly at her.

Kitsune cocked her head. "Would you, really? Even if you had to explain to your father why you'd butchered another poor, helpless woman, just like Ta--"

"Don't. Say. Her. Name." Leo hissed through gritted teeth. He leaned forward, taking deep breaths as he fought to maintain control. "Splinter doesn't understand you, not like I do. He doesn't realize you're more dangerous than Saki ever was. All your boyfriend could do was kill people. You can _break_ them."

"Like I broke you," said Kitsune. The smirk stayed on her face; if she felt any pain at the mention of Saki Leo couldn't see it.

He nodded. "Yes. You broke me. But I had people to put me back together, and I will do whatever it takes to keep them safe from you."

She gave a beautiful smile with something in it. "Look at you: so fierce, so strong. You have to be, don't you? If you stop fighting, you'll crumble to dust." She glanced down at his hands. "Have you started dislocating your fingers again?"

The world skittered to a halt. "What?"

"You did that when Raphael was missing, didn't you? Punishing yourself for your weakness, your failures. You'd pop them out of joint and then put them back in. A good way to hurt yourself without anyone noticing, especially considering your family's...relaxed standards of dress."

Leo looked down at his hands without meaning to. He had done some of that in Northampton, although it'd been a lot worse when Raph was missing. But...nothing like that had been in the visions, he'd hoped that there were some parts of himself Kitsune just hadn't bothered to notice--

"Leo, darling," said Kitsune, shaking her head with false pity. "I had to look through quite a few memories before I found the useful ones. Did you really not suspect?" Her eyes were running him through. "I know every nightmare you've had, every insecurity that's kept you awake, every wet dream. I know the exact number of times you've pleasured yourself, which is frankly rather lower than is healthy for a boy your age--"

"Why?" he asked, no longer able to look at her.

Her eyes flickered with confusion, maybe real, maybe false. "Why, what?"

"Why did you do that to me? Why do you _care?"_ He shook his head. "I never did anything to you, my _family_ never did anything to you. Your brother talks of pawns and knights and all that, but you people are _immortals._ You don't _need_ us, not really. Is this just _fun_ for you?"

She arched a delicate brow. "I was merely following the wishes of my love and lord--"

"Bullshit. You could have made Saki forget us, if you wanted to. It would have been _easier_ if he had, easier for both of you. So... _why?"_ He pointed to his temple. "Why did you _do_ this? Were you just _bored?"_

Kitsune studied him carefully. "You know, that's a very interesting question. No one's every asked me that before. Sometimes, I do it for pleasure, yes. Sometimes I do it out of curiosity. You..." She leaned forward, eyes glittering. "I'm going to let you in on a little secret--I didn't want Saki to get too full of himself, not yet. He needed an enemy, someone to keep him on his toes. He needed a clan that was _angry_ at him, because nothing encourages a good war like a stolen--"

Suddenly, the ground was too far away, his head was swimming. He was standing up, a sword was gleaming in his hands even though he didn't remember drawing it. The blade flickered before his eyes, splitting up like the claws Shredder had given him. He'd loved those claws, once. He'd loved the Shredder, too, because she'd made him.

Losing that love had felt like Leo's heart being ripped out of his chest, and she'd done it all to _keep Saki on his toes._

Kitsune looked up on him, face calm. "Now, you're just being dramatic, _chunin_." She sipped, not seeming to notice the blade at her throat. "You have demons, yes, but you needed _help_ to even think about following through on them. You couldn't do the deed with Koya after she tried to kill you, what make you think you can pull it off now?"

His head was spinning. He couldn't breathe.

"I ran your soul through my fingers, child. I know precisely what you're capable of. And even if I don't live inside your head anymore, I still have my mark on you. I wrote myself into your _soul,_ after all. Hurting me would be like hurting yourself."

Leo sighed, hands shaking. He lowered his sword.

Kitsune smiled at him.

Leo smiled back, and whipped the blade at her neck.

A shockwave rippled through the sword just as the edge touched Kitsune's skin, sending it flying out of his hands and crashing against the wall. Kitsune lurched to the side, gasping, one hand on her neck. She looked up at him and Leo knew the astonishment in her eyes was real. No fear--of course not, she was an immortal--but surprise, which maybe was a different kind of fear to someone like her.

"I wasn't sure if that would work," Leo said. "Pity." He went over to the corner and picked up his sword, swinging back into its sheath. "I don't want to kill people," he explained. "But you're not a person to me. You're the ugly little demon who lives in the back of my heart."

Kitsune was looking at him, mouth working as she tried to put together a comeback. Leo didn't feel like sticking around to continue their insane, useless little battle of wits, so he started heading for the door.

"You're an immortal," he called over his shoulder. "Which means death has never touched you, yet. But I've seen death, and I came back from it. Who knows, maybe if the cycle keeps up I'll end up outliving you. That might be nice."

He swung the door closed behind him, cutting off her reply.

Afterwards, he went to the bathroom and retched until he feared that he would start throwing up blood. He collapsed on the cold tile floor, shaking from fear, both of Kitsune and of himself. The world was tipping upside down around him again, and no matter how many times he experienced that sensation it never got any easier.

He starting tugging on one of his fingers, but yanked his hands apart before he could pull it out of joint again. He wouldn't give that bitch the satisfaction of being proved right about him, not anymore.

When he finally crawled into bed, Leo was so emotionally exhausted that he dropped off to sleep within a few minutes. He didn't have any nightmares, nor did he receive any comforting visits from his mother.

He dreamed of nothing at all, and for now, that was bearable.


	4. Desperate

They'd been at the farmhouse for two months, and things were getting desperate. April had found her parents' emergency stash of cash, but that hadn't been intended to feed five people--six if you counted Leo, who was being regularly tube-fed by Donnie. Buying Leo's medical equipment had made a huge dent in their resources, too.

April and Casey had been trying to supplement their resources by doing odd jobs, but those were becoming more scarce now that there was no longer any snow to shovel. Mr. O'Neil was flying around New York City in a deranged haze again, a fact that kept April awake at night with pain and worry, so there was no chance of getting their hands on his credit or debit cards. They were running out of money, which meant they were slowly, steadily running out of food.

Everybody had started taking smaller portions at their meals, although no one dared mention it out loud. One or the other turtles would occasionally beg off dinner for a night, and April found herself doing the same.

She'd never been hungry, not really. This was more than "skipped breakfast while rushing to school" hunger. This was a slow burn that grew stronger the less she ate, carefully digging away at her stomach lining. This was something that left her lightheaded after training, something that made her snappish and irritable, something that had her staring in the mirror, trying to figure out if her cheeks were slimmer or her breasts were smaller.

A part of her was bitter at Leo for being asleep, for keeping them in this suffocating, starving paralysis instead of leading them back to the city to reclaim their lives. Another part was bitter at all the turtles for not being human, for preventing them from being honest with an adult about their situation and seeking help. April hated herself for feeling that way, but she couldn't stop it.

She had started spending more time out of the house, unwilling to cope with everyone else's hunger and anxiety as well as her own. When she walked in the woods, April could take deep breaths of the sweet spring air and pretend that she was feasting on flowers and birdsong, the way she used to when she was small.

Hunger made her exhausted quickly, though, and she was propping herself up on a tree when she heard footsteps. She frowned, tilting her head--she didn't remember anyone following from the farmhouse, and she couldn't understand why they didn't announce themselves earlier.

Then a man rounded the corner, pointing a rifle at her, and her heart stopped beiatng. Her hand flew to her leg, but her Tessen was gone--she'd left it on her dresser again. Stupid. _Stupid._

"The fuck?" He lowered the gun, squinting at her through piggy eyes in a squishy white face. "You oughta be careful, little miss. I thought you were a deer."

"Excuse me?" April said, squaring her shoulders and taking a step towards him. She focused on her anger, trying to use it to bury the panic. "This is private property."

"Eh, the locals have been gone for ages. Guy killed his wife and ran off, some shit like that." He holstered his gun and started walking away. "Besides, it's a free country."

April tensed, but forced her voice to remain level--the last thing she wanted to do was escalate the situation. "I'm going to ask you to leave," she said, stepping into his path. "Be quick about it, and I _might_ not call the cops on you."

He stared at her, eyes incredulous before they flattened to anger. "You shitting me?" he growled. "I came out here to get _away_ from whining bitches, and that's exactly what I find?"

Her hand moved before she could stop it, and her palm cracked across his face. "Take. That. Back," she hissed. Some dark leapt up into his eyes, something vicious and cruel that made her think of Kraang-Prime's dead gaze.

"Mouthy cunt!" He punched her in the stomach, expelling all her air in a painful rush. April staggered, trying to shift into a fighting stance, but he grabbed her by the wrist with bruising force and threw her to the ground.

He leapt on top of her, and she kicked and screamed, even though there was no one in earshot who could come help. She could unbalance him, she _knew_ she could, she just had to remember Master Splinter's lessons...but her lungs weren't working and she was so weak and tired and the fear was filling her up, burning her brain to nothing...

The man pinned her arms over her head and looked April up and down, his face lit up with a kind of hunger that she knew wasn't for food. "Pretty little thing, aren't you?" he said. "I bet that's how you get away with all the shit you pull."

He squeezed her breast and she shrieked, shrieked so loud her throat hurt and her head spun for of lack of air. "Someone ought to teach you a lesson," he muttered, almost to himself.

The branches rattled above them, even though there was no wind. He didn't notice.

His hands were slipping into her shorts now, and April was writhing and clawing desperately, wishing that she could slip out of her skin and flee into the trees. His touch was like acid, but she couldn't think, couldn't concentrate, couldn't even muster the air to scream or beg.

The man's hands pulled away from her underwear, and she almost fainted with relief, but then he reached into his own pants and pulled a throbbing dick. "Like that?" he asked, shaking it at her face. "Grew it nice and special, just to show little teases like you what's wha--"

His dick exploded.

Blood spattered over them both, hot and pumping. He screamed, falling backward, and April staggered to her feet, hocking up phlegm. The man stood, swaying as the blood streamed from between his legs in a bright, fierce rush the put the worst periods to shame.

He let out a vicious cry and charged her. April threw up her hands, some hazy idea about self-defense flickering through her brain, and he went flying backward. He slammed into the fork of a tree, upper body falling backward with a terrifying _crack_ as he hung, limp and twitching, his gasps for air echoed through the clearing. He was bent into the perfect shape of an _n_ , an inhuman angle.

For a moment, April's brain stopped working. Then she screamed again, and this time several nearby trees toppled backwards, hitting the ground with earthshaking crashes. She almost fell again, but she stayed upright and ran for her life.

Miracles of miracles, she had just enough self-awareness left to try the barn instead of the main house, crashing through the door and startling Donnie from where he hunched his beakers. "April, what--" his eyes dropped open at the sight of the blood staining her shirt and face. She collapsed in his arms, shaking and sobbing.

Her memories of the next hour were fractured and blurred, a pretty accurate representation of her state of mind in the time. She remembered Donnie helping her out of her clothes so she could clean off, discreetly turning his back as she rubbed off the blood with Wet Wipes. He brought her dry things to wear and held her to his chest while she sobbed out the whole, horrible little story.

He tensed when she described what had almost happened, asking her over and over again if she was hurt. "I'm so sorry," he whispered, stroking her hair. "It's not your fault."

When she confessed what she'd down, he didn't react. She could feel surprise coming from him, but no shock or fear. She was so relieved by that she didn't bother to wonder why until later.

At some point they were wandering through the woods together, looking for the place where she'd left the man. He was dead when they finally found him, although the body still looked relatively untouched. April realized that she couldn't remember if he'd been dead yet when she left him. She'd wondered how long it had taken him to suffocate on his broken spine and the organs that Donnie, prodding his ribs, said had been punctured.

She wondered if she was supposed to care.

They stood there in awkward silence for a few minutes, just staring. Or, April did. After a few seconds she realized that Donnie was poking through the man's jean pockets, his face composed and businesslike. "Eureka," he breathed, pulling out a brown leather wallet.

He flipped it open and studied the contents appraisingly. "He's got about eighty in cash," he said thoughtfully. "Debit and credit cards, that's good. I'll draw up a map of ATMs, we'll have to squeeze as much cash out of this as we can before he's reported missing." He glanced off into the trees, eyes narrowed. "I wonder if I'll be able to track down his car from here, we could use that instead--"

"Wait," April said, cutting him off. "We're _robbing_ him?" For some reason, the idea shocked her almost as badly as the exploding dick had.

"We need the money," Donnie said simply. "Besides, you already killed him. Robbing him is differently the lesser sin." He shot her the same reassuring smile he had when they'd first met and he'd been trying to convince her he wasn't a monster.

"It was an _accident,_ " April insisted. Was it? She couldn't remember.

"Well, he deserved it anyway," said Donnie, shutting the wallet and stuffing it back into his pocket.

"What about his family?" April asked. "He mentioned people." She winced at the memory of the harsh word, _bitches._ "They might be happier without him, but they'll still need the money."

Donnie shrugged. "They're human, they're probably got a ton of relatives to help them along. At the worst, they can just get welfare." Her breath stilled at the words; she'd never heard him sounding so _cold_ before, so calloused.

He grabbed the body, pulling it from the tree with a _pop_ that made April flinch. "If we dispose of the body and the car, they'll probably just think he grabbed the cash and ran out on them." He slung the body over his shoulder.

"You're not putting that in the backyard," April said, moving towards him and trying not to think of any parallels to her encounter with the hunter. Donnie would never hurt her, but...this side of him, it was something she'd never seen before. She didn't know what to think of it.

Of course she'd shown a new side of her own today, she thought, glancing at the bloody hole in the man's pants.

"I'm not burying him," Donnie said quietly, looking down at his feet.

"Then what are you doing? Do we stick it in the car and roll it down a cli--"

"Even with the extra cash, we'll still going to have to stretch our resources so we don't get caught in the lurch again before Leo wakes up," Donnie told her, staring fixedly at the grass. "Leo's protein shakes are the most expensive. It would be a lot easier if we got them from...another source."

The world tipped upside down. She was standing on solid ground, but she was also hanging off the edge of everything. Her mind was shaking under the weight of too many shocks and Donnie had just given her the greatest one yet.

"What," she said, because she couldn't get enough air to add a question mark. April filled her lungs and forced out a "What?"

Donnie looked at her sadly, but didn't say anything.

"You, you can't--that's _cannibalism."_

"It really isn't," Donnie said, his voice completely free of condescension. "We're not members of the same species, after all."

She'd shake her head, but she was worried that she would fall over. "You, you can't feed your brother a _person."_

Donnie shrugged. "It wouldn't be his first time."

Her mouth dropped open. She'd read about that in books and always thought it was a ridiculous expression. Now she discovered it was, in fact, based on real life, and yes, she did have to make an effort to close it again.

Donnie was staring directly at her now, his eyes hypnotic pools of red and brown. "We were twelve," he said, voice sounding far older than it should have. "I think you'll remember that it was one of the worst New York City winters in a decade. Most of the algae died, and the rats and dogs weren't much better. Father would leave us alone for hours--I'd have nightmares about him not coming back--and he'd come home with practically nothing. The dumpsters were frozen, and most of the things he dug out were barely edible.

"It was bad. Worse than anything we've had so far out here. Father's fur was literally falling out in clumps, that's how bad it was. He cancelled training so we wouldn't burn excess calories and we'd just hide in a bedroom together all day, making each other miserable. Leo would actually let us chew on him, to help us feel better. He'd get covered in bruises, it's a miracle we didn't give him an infection.

"First, Father stole people's groceries. I think he thought that was enough, but we'd eat too fast and get sick. We'd go through it so quickly, and then we'd still be hungry--we almost killed each other over the scraps. No one ever bought enough to feed four growing turtles. New Yorkers and their goddamn diets." Donnie laughed, harshly.

"He started getting desperate, getting sloppy. One time someone actually injured him, laid him low for three days. He cut himself where the fur had fallen out, poured his blood in plastic cups and told us to drink it. When he was asleep and we didn't want to wake him, Leo gave us some of his own blood. There are scars on his wrist, under his wrappings, that we're not allowed to talk about, ever.

"After he got better, I guess Father decided that enough was enough. He...I was the only one to see him bring the bodies home. Leo was telling the others a story to distract them, but I got bored and wandered off. I looked out the door, saw him dragging them. He had to rest every few seconds, he was so weak. He put them in an alcove, wrapped them up in plastic. It worked pretty well as a makeshift freezer.

"They were maintenance men, I think. It was hard to tell, with all the blood.

"That night, we had meat. We had meat, and it gave Father the strength to find vegetables, sometimes. But we always had meat. Father's fur grew back, we could train again, everything was fine.

"Mikey asked where it was all coming from once, and Father told us that he'd shot some deer in Central Park. He made us offer our gratitude to the deer's spirits, for their sacrifice. And no one told him no, that's ridiculous, you couldn't have run around Central Park with a bow and arrow. We couldn't. If we faced that fact, what he'd done, what kind of world we lived in where that had to be done, it would destroy us.

"I think that everybody else has...edited their memories of that winter, to one extent or another. I'm pretty sure that if I asked Splinter point-blank, 'Did you kill people for us to eat when we were twelve?' he'd genuinely think I had lost my mind. But I...I don't forget things. I can't. That's my burden and my gift."

He walked over to her, until they were close enough to kiss or kill each other. "I'm a mutant, April, and so are you. We are members of an endangered species, which means we have to do whatever it takes to survive." He adjusted the hunter's weight on his shoulder. "I'll do what's necessary to protect you and my brothers. And I think you understand that. I think you would do the same."

She wanted to scream that he was a monster, a beast out of hell, that she was nothing like him. She wanted to hate him for making her face these things. She wanted to rip the fabric of the universe apart and send this whole terrible day plummeting into the void.

But she couldn't, because he was right. She knew she was right. She understood his logic regarding the use of resources, his fear of starvation, his attitudes regarding her. April do whatever was necessary to protect herself and her friends. Her eyes darted to the dead man, to his slack, wretched face. Hadn't she proven that already?

Like almost everything else Donnie said and did, it made perfect sense when you thought about it.

April's shoulders slumped. "Fine," she said. She started back towards the farmhouse and Donnie followed her.

"I'll put... _this_...in your barn's freezer and then I'll look up the ATM's," he said as he walked along, the man's head bumping gently against his shell. "Once I find the car, I can push it down one cliff or another."

"I'll help you," April said, startling them both a little. "And--and I'll tell the others that I found a secret envelope of cash lying somewhere around here, or an emergency bank account password."

Donnie blinked at her, before giving a small smile. "Thank you."

They walked along for a few more minutes; there was a question on her tongue that she both did and didn't want to ask. But April knew that she and Donnie would never speak about this day again, though, the same way that Donnie's family had never spoken about that brutal winter again, so she decided to take the opportunity while she could.

"If I hadn't...caught...that man," she said carefully. "What would have happened to Casey? You didn't mention him when you talked about the people you wanted to protect." She took a breath. "Would he have just disappeared one night?"

Donnie stared straight ahead. "Casey's a good person," he said. "Annoying as hell, yes, and not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but good. Good, brave, and ridiculously loyal. As much as we fight, I've come to the conclusion that he's become one of my friends. If something were to happen to him the whole family would be devastated, especially Raph and you."

"That didn't answer my question," April pointed out.

Donnie nodded. "I know. But I think you already know the answer."

April did know, she realized. She didn't have to be a psychic to put the pieces together. It would have been so easy for Donnie to creep into Casey's room and snap his neck, steal him away, crush him into a shake or cook him in a stew.

The real question, April knew, was whether she would have found herself doing the same in Donnie's place. If it was her siblings in danger of starving again, if she'd been the one nourished on human remains and Leo's willingly spilled blood.

She suspected she knew the answer to that one, too, and it chilled her blood. But if she could live with the ghost of the dead man's hands on her body and the bright flicker of his blood behind her eyes, she could live with that.

They finished the walk back to the farmhouse in silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know that "girl kills the guy who tries to rape her" might be a bit of a cliche, but I wanted to ease April's seduction to the Gray Side as much as possible. Also, exploding dicks.


	5. Enemy

"You're my enemy," Raph repeats, stalking towards him. His eyes are white and his claws are drawn and there's a small part of Casey that wants to run away screaming, but he holds his ground.

"Um, no dude, not really," he says, lifting his mask so Raph can see his face, covered with paint and fixed in what he hopes is a friendly smile. "By the way, I've got to ask: did Shredder see _Wolverine?_ Because that's a real brainwashed-Deadpool vibe you've got going on there." He gestures to the terrible claws. "Or maybe he was going for Freddy Krueger instead?"

Leo groans from where he's lying on the floor behind him, hands pressed to his stomach and bad leg held at an awkward angle. Raph's brother tried to talk him out of this by making him angry; it was a good idea, one Casey would have used if he had the opportunity, but it had backfired spectacularly. Leo's swords lie broken on the ground, not that Casey would have known how to use them if they were whole.

"Casey, go," Leo hisses through gritted teeth, trying and failing to haul himself upright. "Get out of here!"

"Nah, dude, it's cool," Casey says, shooting him a reassuring grin. "It's fine. Raph here's just screwin' around, but he's gonna get bored of this real fast and then everything will be fine." Leo lets out a choked, confused gasp, but Casey plows ahead. "Ain't that right, Raph? You've had your fun, given Leo some marks that he'll remember _maybe_ 'til the next training session, now take those stupid things off and let's go home."

He jokes, but Casey knows that Raph would have been-- _would be--_ devastated by what he'd done to Leo. Once, when they were both drunk and stoned, he'd confessed to Casey that Leo was secretly his hero. _I hate him, but I love him so much at the same time,_ he'd said. _Do you get what that's like?_

Casey had thought of his dad, passed out in the living room with a bottle of booze to hide from his dead wife and crippled leg, slowly becoming one with the couch while they subsisted off of welfare, and said _yeah._

"You're my enemy," Raph says yet again, swinging his claws at Casey's head. He dodges out of the way, feeling the wind from the claws ruffle his hair.

"That's getting pretty old, dude," Casey points out, backing towards the wall. _Get him away from Leo. That's all that matters. Get him away from Leo and you'll be able to figure this out._

"Master Shredder wants you dead," Raph tells him, making another swipe with the claws. This one slices a piece off Casey's shirt, but he doesn't go for his hockey sticks. He doesn't want to hit Raph, not when he's like this. Not to mention that it might make things worse (if that's even possible).

"Okay, there's some variety, I'll give you that," Casey pants. "But still, 'Master Shredder?' You're really going to slice me up on the orders from a guy who named himself after a piece of office equipment?"

Raph growls and charges him. Casey throws himself aside at the last possible second, yelping as the claws draw a line of fire down his shoulder. "Not cool, dude!"

He expects Raph to round on him, but he just keeps running at his brother instead. Leo tries to stand up and falls on his side with a shriek of pain. "Raph, no--"

" _Shit_!" Casey throws himself forward and slams his taser into Raph's armpit, sending him crumpling with a howl. "What the fuck was that, man?"

Raph groans as Casey jumps on top of him, trying to pry his claws off. "Master Shredder wants...him dead...more," he mumbles, jaw twitching.

"Well, that's fucking ru-ahh!" Casey's toppled off as Raph lurches to his feet and scrambles backward. "I don't want to hurt you!"

"You're my _enemy,"_ Raph snarls, bringing the claws down. Casey rolls out of the way, but can't hold in a cry as one of the blades slices open his calf before striking sparks against the ground.

"I'm getting really fucking _sick_ of that," Casey moans, staggering upright. _Breathe. Breathe through the pain. You've survived so much worse._ "I mean, Jesus, do you even know who I am? Do you even know who _you_ are?"

Raph swings another claw and Casey grabs a stick, because he has no choice. Metal snags in wood and they both go tumbling to the ground, muscles straining as they fight for control.

"Your name is Raphael," Casey gasps. "It's the name of an artist, but also the name of an angel. That always bothered you, you never thought it fit." Raph hits his hand free, breaking the stick, and Casey has to fling himself to the side once more. The claws trace a thin line down his back, but he barely feels the pain.

"You listen to Fall Out Boy and The Unlikely Candidates, but you also listen to Halsey and Melanie Martinez," Casey says, rolling to his feet. "You're terrified of your brothers finding out about that. You're terrified of your brothers finding out a lot of things, probably more than you should."

He's swinging his bat back and forth like a metronome, letting Raph's claws scrape across the wood. The bat's falling to pieces in his hands, and the fact that he's backing away instead of attacking makes things worse. Casey doesn't care.

"You knit stuff for your family, but you won't let them take the things they get out of their rooms. You made me a scarf for birthday and I got drunk and cried about it. You met my sister, by accident, and when she told you you looked like Kermit you said thanks. Once, when I got sick and couldn't read for my blind neighbor, you stood in for me."

Part of the bat cracks away, leaving a jagged edge sharp enough to pierce skin. Casey sees an opening to jam it in Raph's skin and doesn't take it.

"You and Leo found a dead body floating in the sewers when you were seven, and you both had nightmares for months afterwards. You used to lie in bed together to make the nightmares go away. You stopped when you were eight, after you accidentally tried to strangle him in your sleep. You hate yourself for that."

A glance over Raph's shoulder reveals that Leo's passed out, no longer listening. Time to break out the heavy stuff.

"Once when you were drunk you told me that your first crush was Daniel Radcliffe. When you were sober, you told me it was Emma Watson, and I was pretty sure that was bullshit. When I told you that some guys at school called me Crazy Casey, you tracked the worst ones down and beat them up. Your father and brothers drive you crazy, but you're terrified of disappointing them. You have a stuffed rabbit that you sleep with sometimes, and if you're feeling really bad you talk to it because Spike's gone."

"SHUT UP!" Raph screams, knocking the remains of the bat aside and swinging his claws at Casey's face. He throws himself backward, head smacking into the wall, and fires another blast from his taser to send Raph staggering.

"When we were on the farm," Casey says, slipping on his spiky pads, "We used to talk to each other about how much we..." he sucks in a breath, "...hated ourselves for letting the people we love get hurt. You told me once that you'd thought about killing yourself, but didn't want to live a horrible mess for us to find." Tears prick his eyes at the memory.

His spikes shriek against Raph's claws, and Casey knows that he should be destroyed instantly, but Raph's off-balance and his face is twitching. Maybe Casey's getting to him, maybe the worm is starting to fry his brain. Either way, he presses on:

"You hate Star Wars a little, because the good guys have blue lightsabers and the good guys only use red, and you feel like that says something about you and Leo, and why Splinter chose your colors. Sometimes you feel like you're suffocating down there in the sewers, and it's only gotten worse now that you know topside is an option. You have nightmares where you lose control and hurt someone you love. Sometimes that someone is me."

A claw digs into a glove, cutting a knuckle before Casey snaps his hand away. "You're my enemy," Raph says distantly, his eyes looking lost and strange.

Casey smiles sadly and decides to say something he's been holding back for a very long time, because if he's going to die he might as well get all the secrets off his chest first. "When I saw you for the first time, on the streets," he says, "I thought you were the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen."

Raph stills, his green eyes going wide.

"I hated myself for that. You were a _boy_ , you beat me up, you weren't even _human_ , what was wrong with me? April was the hot girl, the cute friend, the one I should like. So I tried, I really tried. But I couldn't keep my eyes off you, and I don't care if that's mushy because it's true. When the Creep hurt you, I thought I was going to die from the pain. I really did."

"You're. My. Enemy." Raph forces out, shaking his head like a wet dog.

"We've been enemies before. It didn't stick."

Raph lets out a scream and charges. Their weapons clash, faces inches apart. Casey forces himself to hold his ground, legs shaking. "I love you, Raphael Hamato," he says. "I love your muscles and your personality and your voice and your eyes. I'd love you even if you were like this forever. And I love you enough to do something as ridiculously sappy as this."

He leans forward and presses his lips to Raph's. It's wet and it's sweet and it's terrifying and it's nothing like Casey imagined and it's everything he ever dreamed of.

For a moment there's nothing, no movement, and Casey wonders if he's going to die it like this. He thinks it might be a decent way to go.

And then, slowly, surely, Raph kisses back. His muscles relax, his hands slumping to his sides, and Casey does the same. They lean into each other for a moment, the noises of battle fading into the distance. Casey feels his heart slow, feels at peace.

Then Raph drops to his knees and throws up the brain worm, followed by this morning's breakfast and last night's pizza.

"Well," says Casey, watching the vomit splash over his shoes. "That was pretty much how I expected my first kiss to go."

"Case," Raph moans, clutching his head. "It hurts..."

"I know," Casey soothes, dropping down by his side, not caring about the puke. "It's all right, dude. You're safe."

Raph whimpers, shakes his head. "Leo--I, I hurt him, I hurt _y-y_ _ou._."

"He'll be okay. We'll be both be okay," Casey promises, pulling Raph's head into his chest and stroking the back of his head. Raph leans into the touch, his breath soft and warm on Casey's neck. "Everything's going to be okay."

He rises to his feet, wincing at the pain, and pulls Raph up with him. "Now, come on, let's take your pain-in-the-ass brother home." Raph leans into his side, and it feels like he fits perfectly. Raph must feel the same, because he doesn't pull away as they go to get Leo.


	6. Firsts

Leo's first time is with Karai, and it's violent. They roll around in her bedroom at Foot headquarters, biting and clawing at each other, staining the sheets with blood. Sometimes she's on top, sometimes it's him. This is an indulgence, a moment to forget the crushing responsibilities they both bear as leaders. It's also a release, a way to express their pain and fury at themselves and each other and the world and the people who've hurt them in a brutally physically matter.

Or maybe they just both like biting. Whatever it is, it makes them feel happy, happier than they are within anyone else.

Afterwards, Karai traces swirls of blood across her palm while Leo chants his mantra, healing their wounds. They agree to meet same time next week; Leo says he'll think about it when she suggests "raising the stakes" at some point, trying out new toys or scenarios. They both suspect that he'll probably say yes eventually.

Raph's first time is with Mona Lisa, and it's...unusual. Salamandarians have both male and female characteristics (as humans judge them), a fact that Raph only discovered a few weeks into their relationship and was more intrigued by than he'd ever admit to anyone else. They indulge in a good amount of careful exploration before they're finally ready for sex.

He sits in Mona's lap, feeling safe and warm withing the embrace of her tail, penetrating her vagina while she works her penis inside him. He's worried about being too small, she's worried about being too big, but after an awkward start they work out a decent rhythm.

Afterwards, they fall asleep together and Raph wakes up screaming with memories of the brain worm. He's humiliated until Mona Lisa strokes his head and tells him that for her people mental scars are just another wound, as honorable as a missing leg or eye. He tries to believe her.

Donnie's first time is with Casey, and it's sort of an accident. The imbecile wanders into his lab, drunk and lonely, while Donnie's doing some _very_ important work. He keeps chattering and asking ridiculous questions until Donnie finally gets fed up and kisses him just to make him stop (hey, he was desperate and hadn't slept in a while). To his great surprise, Casey kisses back.

Somehow Casey's clothes end up on the floor, and then Donnie's tipping him onto the nearest table as the human's teeth sink into his neck. Casey drunkenly slurs a request to hear Donnie talk in another language, and Donnie ends up babbling away in Russian before pretty much losing control.

Afterwards Casey snores on the table while Donnie lies awake besides him, his brain divided into three section: one drifting in post-orgasmic bliss, one screaming _holy shit I'm in love with this moron,_ and one trying to calculate how much cleaning fluid he'll need to make this workstation sanitary again.

Mikey's first time is with Mondo Gecko, and it happens on Halloween night. They'd dressed up as Batman (Mikey) and Darth Vader (Mondo) before sneaking into a party, where they both take their first sips of wine and Mondo indulges in just a touch of acid. After Mikey accidentally grazes ( _grazes_ , mind you) a guy in the head while showing off a backflip, they decide it's best to make a hasty exit.

They skip across the grass in Central Park, stripping off their costumes so they can feel the moonlight on their scales. Mikey tackles Mondo to the ground and after they stop rolling around, they decide they don't want to get up right away. They're careful not to damage one another as they make love, leaving each other sticky with sugar and alcohol.

Afterwards, Mikey nestles his head into the curve of Mondo's neck, listening to his heartbeat, reminding himself that it's still there. Mondo counts his freckles, or tries to, but he keeps losing his place.

April's first time is with Shinigami, and it takes place in an apartment that the witch may or may not have hypnotized the landlord into giving her for ten bucks. Shini straddles April, tracing herb-scented fingers down her face as their bodies melt together. April can feel Shini's lust and love, which reflects and amplifies her own.

 _Stay with me, little bird,_ Shini whispers in both their heads, because Shini embraces and encourages April's telepathy more ardently than anyone she's has ever met. _Stay with me, my phoenix._ When they reach climax together, a streetlight shatters outside.

Afterward, Shini weaves strands of their hair together, black melting into red. _Shadow and flame,_ she thinks. _You're so dramatic,_ April replies, nibbling on her ear. "I love you," she whispers aloud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Love is love, and love is weird, and love is beautiful


	7. Ghost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, maybe I have this weird obsession with IDW Tang Shen having more autonomy.

Tang Shen haunts her family's underground home, tracing invisible fingertips over cool stone. She slips through their bedroom doors and stands over their beds, watching them sleep the day away. She can stay with them when they're awake, but it's difficult, and even harder when they're on the move as they so often are. Dream time, on the other hand, is the ghost's time.

Not that she can enter her family's dreams, except in times of greatest need. Push too hard, too often, and she risks becoming an invader rather than a guardian. But if she puts effort into it, she can occasionally disturb a blanket or knock over an object, stirring her children or husband out of a nightmare.

Sometimes she hums lullabies, the way she could when they were small. She whispers her children's names in their ear, their true names, the ones that even Yoshi has forgotten. She wishes that he could remember those names, that her children didn't have to walk around with the names of a bunch of old dead _gaijin,_ given to them by an admittably well-meaning girl who was treating them as pets at the time.

She wishes she could do more. She wishes she could hold them in her physical arms, give them loving words through physical lips, fight by their side with physical weapons. She wishes for so much.

Sometimes, she hates the forces that decided she was not worthy to cross over with them. Shen would take any body--a cat's, a snakes, a _cockroach's_ \--just to be with the people she loves, to return to the living world the way they have.

If she's not careful, the anger will overwhelm her, causing lightbulbs to shatter or panels to crack. Then poor Donatello is forced to clean up the mess made by a woman he considers to be a fiction. Tang Shen strokes his head in silent apology, imaging what it would be like if he could feel her touch. She does her best to control herself, to embrace the role of watcher rather than protector.

She tries to look for Raphael when he is separated from the family, but quickly gets lost in the swirling streets of New York, in the mechanical grind of this futuristic city. She encounters four hundred years' worth of ghosts from every corner of the world and interrogates them to the best of her ability. A man who calls himself Blind Buck claimed to have been with her son once, but he had no idea where Raphael was now.

When her baby finally comes home, Tang Shen is so happy. She wraps her arms around his beautiful shell while Yoshi hugs him from the front, all three of them hoping everything would be better.

Raphael's past has left scars, of course, scars that even Tang Shen will never fully understand. She sees the way he sits on his bed the first few weeks, watching the door with muscles tensed, wondering if there would be a price to pay for his new home. The sight breaks her heart, but she can do nothing to soothe his fear. She has to wait for her son to learn to trust his family on his own.

Things are better now, if not perfect. Raphael sometimes has nights where he sleeps on the floor, his body having grown accustomed to hard beds. Sometimes he'll wake up for a random weight session, or to get a snack from one of the stashes of food he hides around his room.

He's not the only one with unusual sleeping habits. Donatello often insists on staying up long after his brothers and father have gone to bed, poking away at one of his funny little machines. Sometimes an exasperated Shen will dim the lights or disable his precious coffeemaker in order to force him off to bed, or wake up one of his brothers so they can realize how long he's been up and make him go to sleep.

Leonardo and Yoshi (Splinter, why does he still call himself Splinter? It makes no sense) sleep better, although they'll occasionally get up to meditate after a bad dream. They also mutter to themselves in Japanese. Yoshi whispers her name and Leonardo calls--or cries--for his mother.

Michelangelo's sleep is the deepest, but when he has nightmares he wakes up screaming the loudest. When Raphael was lost he had terrible dreams of his older brother suffering, of him being hurt by humans or eaten by monsters. After Raphael came back safe and sound, Tang Shen hoped that all of her children would be able to sleep better.

But the horrors of the past haunt them still, and new horrors invade their modern lives with an alarming frequency. Her family faces battle, faces monsters, faced their own inner demons. Oroku Saki is hunting them yet again, the way he had all those centuries ago, as if nothing had changed.

When he steals Leonardo away, Tang Shen wants to scream. She wants to shatter every window, rip the church apart at its moorings, shred Saki apart from the inside out. But none of that would help Leonardo, so she pours her strength into carefully prying him away from Kitsune's control.

The effort leaves her exhausted, but she still managed to follow them to Northampton and help put her family back together. Leonardo's brainwashing has left deep scars on them all, ones that they can only tuck behind carefully prepared facades.

Leonardo puts on a good front for his brothers when they get home. Tang Shen is the only one to witness his flashbacks, his quiet meltdowns, his agonizing nightmares. Sometimes she wakes Yoshi up to come to his side, letting Leonardo sob in his arms.

There comes a day when she finds her eldest son carefully digging into his right wrist with a knife, adding to the scars that have already started to collect beneath his wrappings. Shen throws himself at him, pouring every modicum of her power into ripping the knife from his grip and slam it into the wall. "Mother?" he calls, looking around in confusion, but she is already gone, melting back into the the ether.

It's over a week in living-time before she is able to return from the astral plane, but it's worth it. She never catches Leonardo doing that to himself again, and never see any new scars on his arms.

Occasionally the Rat King draws near their home, looking it over with hungry eyes. Tang Shen stands at the doorway, arms crossed, silent and unmoving. They gaze at each other for the while, each wondering if they could defeat the other.

Usually the old bastard contents himself with making cruel, lustful remarks about her and her family. He does his best to provoke a reaction, but before Tang Shen was a ghost she was a woman, and has had ample opportunity to hone her self-control in both forms.

In the world of the living, matters grow tense. Tang Shen sees Donatello work endlessly on planning for something called the Technodrome. She feels sad when her children clash with her husband on the issue, although she is proud when her sons assert themselves enough to do the right thing. Perhaps such things are not traditionally proper, but they are all far beyond the time of traditions.

The world is saved--but at a terrible cost. Shen realizes too late what is happening to Donatello, and rushes to his side as the monsters left him bleeding in the wreckage of his lab. She and Yoshi work together to prevent his beautiful mind from drifting off into the light.

For a time, Donatello is transformed into a creature that doesn't sleep, eat or breathe. Shen adjusts to that as best she could, watching his mechanical fingers glimmer at his workstation. For all his enhanced sensors, he still can't detect her, although she thinks she is starting to believe in her existence.

When her family is chased from their home yet again, Shen follows them as best as they could. She witnesses Leonardo and Donatello's brutality on the battlefield, and wishes that they could have had another option. She sees Donatello's triumphant return, Yoshi's victory, Saki's bloody fall.

And when her husband takes the control of the Foot Clan, binding himself to the people who hunted and hurt them for so long, Tang Shen truly doesn't know what to feel. That is, until she sees Michelangelo flee into the dark, which was when she begins to suspect her husband has made a terrible mistake.

For the next few months she basically commutes between Michelangelo's shifting location and the rest of her family's uneasy residence in Foot headquarters. She watches Donatello struggle to copes with his trauma, watched how memories of his enslavement jump out at Leonardo whenever he turned a corner. She watches new threats rise and fall, watches tensions build inside her family, hopes that her husband knows what he's doing.

As it turns out, he does not.

She's not present at the murder of Darius Dun, not exactly, but she feels the ripples through the astral plane. By the time her soul weaves back to Foot headquarters, her children are long gone. They have returned to their old home, without their father, eyes shocked and haunted. Leo has a panic attack under the weight of his unwanted new responsibilities, and Shen is powerless to comfort him.

A few nights later, she bulls her way into Yoshi's fitful mind as he sleeps. "What are you doing, you stupid old man?" she asks, as they stand in the middle of her decidedly windswept garden. "What good comes from tearing our family apart?"

He straightens his back, that familiar stubborn look in his eyes. "The children are safest away from me--"

"The children _need_ you," she hisses. "It was cruel to put the burden of leadership on Leonardo's shoulders, and you know it."

"I can offer him advice--"

"He doesn't need _advice._ None of them do. They need someone to comfort them in the night, they need someone to be waiting for them when they come home. They need a _parent,_ not a master."

"And the old way of things, did that keep them safe?" he asks, raising an eyebrow.

Tang Shen shakes her head. "There is no "safe" for our family, not in this world, but there is unity, and empathy." She glares at him. "If you had to have your little blond demon kill that _gaijin_ , you didn't need to do it where they could see."

"Leave Jennika out of this," he bristles.

"Such protectiveness," Tang Shen growls. "Would that you extended it your own children, as well." Yoshi just shakes his head and turns away.

"I will watch after them," she calls as he walks down the path. "I will be at their side, even if _you_ can't be bothered."

And she is. She sits by their bedsides as their repertoire of nightmares grows and changes, humming her lullabies and stroking their heads. She witnesses the aftereffects of their many battles, their triumphs and defeats and in-betweens. She is pleased when Raphael brings home a new pet, a dinosaur who regards Shen with knowing eyes while her master sleeps.

Tang Shen follows them into space, even if she can only glimpse their actions for short, sharp periods. When their journey home is interrupted, she takes the opportunity to meet all four of them again, for the first time. It is beautiful and bittersweet a process as she had hoped (although the presence of the four crazy humans they bring with them is not exactly appreciated).

She doesn't let them see how much the effort exhausts her, leaving her drifting in the astral plane afterwards, the battle of New York a distant echo.

She is drawn back by the reverberations of Leonardo's battle with the Rat King. The strange creatures that inhabit the astral plane whisper and chatter amongst it each other, murmuring about the turtle-boy with blue fire in his eyes, the one who went toe-to-toe with a member of the Pantheon and walked away with his mind intact.

Tang Shen is proud, but also fearful, for the Rat King still lives. He does come to their door anymore, but Tang Shen knows that he is out there somewhere, watching and waiting, plotting his vengeance.

For a time, it seems like her family is slowly, painfully dragging itself back together. The Pantheon even gets involved one Christmas, but none of them offer a straight answer when Tang Shen demands to know why. She wonders if it has anything to do with the ripples she is feeling in the astral plane, the murmurs of a great change coming.

Nonetheless, any healing they can get is precious, especially since Raphael and Michelangelo have recently experienced scarring new traumas. Michelangelo is left grief-stricken by the death of his best friend, and Tang Shen curls up with him on the bed as he sobs into his pillow. Raphael is captured by that monster, Bishop. He ends up sitting on his bed, tense and frightened once more, and Shen weeps to herself at the sight.

She watches, she weeps, and that all she can ever do. If she were still alive, it might kill her.

But now, she fears, she can feel her power draining away. It is getting harder to be with her children, harder to stay by their side while they sleep. Something is happening, both on the astral plane. and outside of the city. Oroku Saki's granddaughter returns with a demon sword at her side. Kitsune has his body, and Tang Shen cannot find it.

Then she is tugged into the depths of the astral plane, and brought face to face with a being that calls herself the Dreamer. She is a creature like no other, caught in a war with her vicious, mad brother. Oroku Saki, it turns out, is the biggest piece in their game, and was more of a pawn than even he realized. Yoshi must be sent to his side, to bring him back from the underworld so he can stop the Dragon--but Yoshi is still alive. 

Saving the world, Shen is told, requires the sacrifice of her husband. Her beautiful, broken, stupid husband, who has finally started to realize his mistakes and come back from the dark. He will ascend to Nirvana, and Shen will go with him.

"I don't want to leave them," she tells the Dreamer. "We--we can't leave our children behind."

"You will see them again," the Dreamer promises.

"Will we?" Shen asks. "The last time, it took centuries."

"You must," the Dreamer says. "A life must be traded for a life in order to bring Oroku Saki, and Hamato Yoshi needs a familiar soul to lead him out of his body, to give his life force to Saki's. You have grown strong over the years, Tang Shen. If any spirit can do it, it is you."

Life force. She must, in essence, kill her husband to save the man who destroyed their lives, the man who literally _ended_ them. Perhaps Saki was more of a victim than Shen though, but still...he has done so many terrible things.

The act breaks Tang Shen's heart, and she might refuse--if it were not the chance to actually _perform_ an act, to do _something_ after so much time of near-total uselessness. Besides, if she does not save the world, then her children will end up following her into Nirvana, and she does not want that.

So when the time comes, she kneels in front of her husband as a battle rages around them, one of many that have claimed the city this night. In the distance she can hear the battle cries of the children--all the children, for her sons have gained a sister, and Tang Shen has grown to believe that she will be worthy of them.

After he finishes his telepathic message to the family, he looks up and sees her in front of him. "Tang Shen..." he whispers, so low that no one can hear it. "It shouldn't have to be you."

"I know," she says, quietly. "I love you."

Then she reaches into his chest and rips out his soul. They let out silent screams as she does, their pain merging and building on one another. All of this is taking place in the space between seconds, so he does not have time yet to fall, but his body hangs limp nonetheless.

Her heart is breaking, but it has broken so many times before, as is life for a Hamato. So she summons all the strength she shares with her children and makes her way to where the burning body of Oroku Saki waits, about to be claimed by its dark master.

Kitsune stands over her granddaughter's body, hands locked around the Kira No Ken, trapped between conflicting desires. Her eyes widen at the sight of Tang Shen holding her husband's life force bundled up in her arms.

"I am not doing this for you," Tang Shen tells her. "I am doing this so my children will have a world to grow up in. Both of you are being given another chance, and if you hurt them I will come back as a tiger and _tear you apart."_

She shoves the soul into Oroku Saki's body, and the world explodes into light.

 _Goodbye, my loves_ , she whispers to her children, not knowing if they can hear her. _Take care of each other_. As she melts into ether one last time, she memorizes their faces, burning them into the core of her being. _I will find you again._

She meets Yoshi in the astral plane, and they forgive each other for what they've done, declare their love one last time. They hold onto each other as the garden disintegrates around them.

 _When I come back,_ she promises herself, leaning into her husband's beautiful form, _I will be a warrior, and I will never sit by helplessly again. This I vow._


	8. Halloween

"Trick of treat!"

The old witch poured candy for the six kids gathered on her doorstep. "And who are you supposed to be, young man?" she asked a morose-looking one standing in the back.

"Can't you tell?" Mikey asked, before Leo could reply. "He's a teenage mutant ninja turtle!"

"Pardon?" She'd never heard of such a thing, not even from her grandchildren.

"Thank you, ma'am," said Leo, giving a small bow and yanking Mikey away from the door.

"Are you gonna bow to everyone ya meet?" Raph asked, smirking beneath his cowboy hat as he smoothed out his duster.

"Shut up," Leo muttered, fingers drumming anxiously on his thighs.

"You didn't take any candy, Leo," April observed, adjusting her Marvel Girl mask.

"Leo doesn't like Halloween candy. Thinks it's too sweet for his Super Monk aesthetic or something," Donnie said, voice muffled from behind his Scream mask. "Personally, I'm only collecting a few samples. I want to find out if the chemicals in these things can be used as a power source or a preservative."

Casey gaped at them through his Daredevil mask. "You guys are literally the biggest dorks on this plane of existence."

"Eat shit," Donnie and Leo said in perfect unison.

"Oh, will you guys stop fighting?" Mikey pouted, flouncing along in his white skirt and bright yellow wig. "This is _Halloween!_ We're supposed to be having fun!" He skipped up the next set of steps. "Trick or treat!"

The man on the other side of the door blinked at him. "What are you supposed to be?"

"She-Ra, duh! Well, I couldn't get the shirt on..." he patted his plastron sadly.

The man frowned. "But you're--"

"Wearing two costumes, yeah," Raph growled, slamming the door in the guy's face.

"Reese's Peanut Butter Cups!" Mikey squealed, holding up his bag with one hand and waving his plastic sword with the other. "Dudes, we hit the motherload!"

"I can't believe your dad never took you guys trick or treating," April mused.

"He tried when we were seven," Mikey said brightly. "Leo threw up, I cried, Raph punched a bigger kid in the nuts, and Donnie got stuck in a tree. I think we gave him, like, ten new grey hairs that night alone."

"Also, we're _ninja_ ," Leo pointed out, scanning the crowd anxiously. "Ninja are supposed to be quiet and unobtrusive."

"Oh, _relax_ , tight shell," Raph said. "Splinter said we could go."

"Mikey had been hanging from the ceiling singing the _Princesses of Power_ theme song for an hour," Leo pointed out. "Splinter would have done anything to get rid of him."

"And it's only going to get worse once he actually consumes some sugar," Donnie added, studying a lollipop thoughtfully. "Maybe I'll sedate him when we get back home."

"Where'd you guys even _get_ the costumes, anyway?" Casey asked, after they'd visited another house (and confused another owner).

"Leo says we're not supposed to tell," Mikey said, chewing a Tootsie Roll.

"We stole 'em," Raph announced proudly.

"We _borrowed_ them," Leo said icily. "We'll return them tomorrow, freshly washed and good as new."

"They had a Captain Ryan shirt, but Leo was lame and didn't take it," Mikey said, tossing a piece of candy corn and biting it out of the air.

"It would have restricted my movements too much," Leo reminded him, looking a little sad.

"Leo thinks the Foot or the Kraang are gonna start shit in the middle of the street," Raph told them.

"What I think is that _someone_ needs to the reasonable adult--"

"Nice swords!" Leo jumped a foot in the air as a boy dressed like Luke Skywalker rapped one of his sheaths. Raph and Casey snickered, and Leo growled as they approached another house.

"How come you're wearing two different costumes?" asked a kid standing next to Raph at the doorstep.

"It's a free country, numbnuts," Raph said.

The kid turned red. "Hey, you can't call--"

Leo grabbed Raph before he could elbow the kid in the stomach and hauled him down the steps. "Remember what I said about starting fights?"

"To do it at the earliest opportunity?"

"Ha ha. I _will_ nerve pinch you and drag you home if I have to."

" _Guuumdrops,"_ Mikey moaned gleefully, poking around in his pumpkin. "That calls for a celebration. Hold this for me, willya?" April took the pumpkin, and was more surprised than she probably should have been to see Mikey doing a gleeful cartwheel in the middle of the street, somehow managing to hold onto his wig with one hand.

"Hey!" a woman barked as Mikey nearly kicked her in the face. "Watch where you're going, young lady."

"Sorry, dudette," Mikey said, popping up with a smile.

She frowned. "You're not a--"

"Apologies, ma'am," Leo interrupted, dragging Mikey away. "I love your costume!" the woman's daughter called, and Mikey blew her a kiss.

"I'm definitely sedating him," Donnie announced. "In fact, I'll probably have to bring along a needle next time. Or maybe I'll just drug his candy."

"What's with the stick?" asked a passing Iron Man. "The Scream guy never had a stick."

"I made a creative design choice inspired by the original film's fluid approach to stereotype," Donnie told him. "Also, my brother's a paranoid bastard."

"Weirdo," the kid muttered.

"Philistine."

"Is Leo really worried about you guys getting attacked?" April asked, frowning.

Donnie shrugged. "I think he's worried more about so-called "regular people" than our usual rogue's gallery."

April glanced down. "Oh," she said sadly.

"Yeah. And Mikey wearing the dress doesn't help, but he loves that stupid show so much that none of us had the heart to tell him no."

"I'm sure everything will be fine," April said reassuringly.

"If any'un meds wid ya'guys, I'll kid dere addes," Casey said through a mouthful of candy.

Donnie glanced at him. "That was a heartwarming, if nigh-incomprehensible statement." Casey chucked a piece of candy at him and Donnie gracefully leaned out of the way.

"Oh! Are you four dressed as...Kermit?" asked the lady at the next house.

"Yes," Donnie told her with a straight face. "Our costumes represent the four aspects of Kermit's appeal to popular culture: de-masculinization," he pointed to Mikey, "aggressive physical violence," he pointed to Raph, "the other," he pointed to himself, "and animalistic con--" Leo grabbed Donnie's pointing finger and tugged him off the porch.

"You're depriving me of my ability to educate the masses," Donnie told him.

Leo groaned. "How are you so _calm?"_ he asked quietly, glancing at all the passerby. "With all these..."

"...humans who could potentially spot us and destroy life as we know it?" Donnie shrugged. "The getup helps, I suppose."

"Oh my god, she had _cookies!"_ Mikey gasped. "I never want Halloween to end!"

"Wait, she gave you cookies?" Raph asked. "Gimme one."

"Nu-uh!" Mikey danced away from Raph's snatching fingers. "You gotta ask nicely first."

Leo went to de-escalate things while April and Casey traded candy and Donnie tried to find the proper words to tell April that she looked absolutely gorgeous in her costume, so none of them were really paying attention when they rounded the corner into an ambush.

"Aaargh, assholes!" screamed a kid in a pirate hat, leaping off a wall to land gracelessly in front of them as his friends crowded in from the street. "Hand over your candy or prepare to be--" A ninja star hit his spray can and it exploded all over him. "What the _fuck!"_ he yowled.

Leo stalked over and yanked the star from the remains of the can. "It's been a stressful enough night as it is," he told the kid's friends, "so we'd be much obliged if you got out of our way, _please_ and _thank you."_

"Hey, is that a dude in a dress?" asked a looming Batman.

"Is that a piece of shit in a stupid helmet?" Raph snarled, raising his fists.

"Ah, look how worried they are about the little faggot," another boy crooned.

"No," Mikey said sweetly, slamming his nunchucks into his crotch, "he was just distracting you." The boy collapsed with a howl.

"You little _shit!"_ Two of the kid's friends lunged for Mikey, but Donnie swept one's legs out from under him with his bo while April grabbed the other by the hand and sent him crashing to the pavement.

"I'm only going to say this once," Leo growled, standing over them. "Halloween is a _very_ special night for my family, so I'd advise you to dispense with the rude remarks and get the hell out of here, because we will not hesitate to put you in the hospital."

The kids all gaped at him for a moment, before helping each other up and staggering away. "Fucking freaks!" one yelled over his shoulder, but the turtles and their friends had already started walking away.

"Aw, man," Casey moaned. "I didn't even get to throw a punch."

"You'll live," Leo said. "I said we _would_ put them in the hospital, not that we _wanted_ to." But there was a small, self-satisfied smile on his face.

"Having fun yet?" April asked him.

"It's...tolerable," Leo admitted, watching Mikey shove his candy into Donnie's hands before doing a celebratory backflip. "But Donnie _is_ going to bring a sedative next time."


	9. Interrogation

"It's fucking creepy," Agent Redstone said, peering in at the turtle wired into a chair. It seemed to smirk in at them through the one-way glass, its red-brown eyes bright and knowing. Even with its bruises and bloody gashes, not to mention what they'd been assured several were broken bones, it managed to sit upright, looking almost regal.

Agent Zuckerman said nothing, although he privately agreed. The techs had barely managed to strap the thing down before it had woken from the sedatives, which shouldn't have happened for another twenty minutes. At least now they had more time to get some answers out of the thing, so they could hand it off to the scientists that much more quickly.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen," the creature said cheerfully as they entered. "What can I do for you today? Come tell the good doctor all your woes-- _aah!"_ Zuckerman hit a button and the turtle jolted as electricity buzzed through its veins, bright and biting.

"What were you doing in that facility?" Redstone demanded.

"Stealing the plans for the Death Star-- _aah!_ You know, that electroshock routine is going to get old pretty fast. The best torturers know the importance of variety. I'd suggest waterboarding, but I _can_ hold my breath for twenty minutes so your arms will probably get tired before-- _aah!"_

"The chair's not for interrogation," Zuckerman said. "It's to keep you restrained." He wasn't lying; the creature had taken a hell of a beating and managed to keep getting back to its feet, hospitalizing four people before it finally stayed down. They couldn't break the thing with pain, not unless they risked actually killing it before it could talk.

" _This,"_ said Redstone, holding up a needle. "is how we're going to interrogate you."

The turtle's eyes went wide for a second before it resumed a relaxed air. "Truth serums are notoriously finicky," it pointed out.

"This one isn't," Redstone declared, tilting the needle so its purple contents caught the light.

The creature slumped back with a groan. "Ah, yes. I knew you had to be doing _something_ vaguely of note with all that nice free alien tech. Tell me, does Bishop know about this?"

"You're mutants, he's an alien. You're out of his jurisdiction," Zuckerman said.

"I've been told that this stings like a _bitch,"_ Redstone added. "Sure you don't want to be a good little mistake of nature and tell us what we want to know right now?"

The creature snickered, even as its fists clenched on the armrests. "Oh you sad, silly boys. I've been through shit you couldn't imagine, not in your wildest nightmares. Do your worst."

Redstone rolled his eyes and jabbed the needle into its neck. The turtle let out a piercing shriek, slamming its head back against the unforgiving metal headboard as fun bubbled at its lips. They watched in silence as it twitched and writhed, giving it a shock whenever it seemed about to burst out of the chair.

Finally, the creature slumped backwards, eyes flickering. " _Fuuuuck..."_ it moaned, a bit of blood dribbling down its chin where it had bit its lip.

Zuckerman pulled up a chair and settled down in front of it, propping his chin casually on his hands. "You ready to talk, sonny boy?" He was answered with a soft groan.

"Good to know," Zuckerman said. "Now, we'll start at the beginning. What were you doing in that facility?"

"Cutting wires," the creature said, eyes glittering strangely. "Sneaking in the shadows, hacking cameras, disabling locks. Fighting when I couldn't do that. Being afraid. Being brave."

Zuckerman sighed. "What I meant was, what was your _goal?"_

"Stealing," the turtle told him. "You have so many _things_ in your cold metal castles. Pretty things, shiny things, lively things. I only wanted a few. Was that so bad?"

Redstone frowned. "Is it supposed to be talking like that?"

"It's fine," Zuckerman told him, waving a hand.

"It's not," said the turtle. "Look at the eyes, look at the way he's sitting. This is a new thing. I'm a new thing, one of the youngest species on earth, and he's never-- _a_ _ah!"_

"On to another topic," said Zuckerman, making an effort to relax. "Where is your little band of freaks hiding?"

"Over hill, over dale, over park, over pale, through flood, through fire, we do wander everywhere, swifter than the moon's sphere, and we serve the fairy quee-- _aah!"_

"Where. Are. They," Zuckerman growled, his voice taut and cold.

"Under some things and over other things," the creature said, eyes flickering to him before returning to the ceiling. "No address, no street name, not even a window except for a TV."

"Could you lead us there?" Redstone asked.

"I'll die first," the turtle said simply.

"Oh, I think we have ways of convincing you," said Redstone, tracing his fingers over the chair's wires.

"And I have ways of dying," the creature said. "So many ways. Nerves to pinch, bones to break. I've thought about it, some times more than others. This body, it is so _fragile_ , and yours are so much _worse._ So many little soft bits, so fleshy, so wea-- _aah!"_ The creature bucked as Redstone zapped him yet again.

"Fragile, eh?" Zuckerman said thoughtfully. "Tell me, do your brothers have any weaknesses we could exploit?"

"My oldest brothers needs pain pills," the creature said, flexing its muscles. "I get them in special ways, secret ways. Nobody knows, unless they do. I have nightmares of him getting addicted, opioid crisis, you know. We're walking a razor's edge. But a monster broke him and I couldn't put him back together right because we didn't have your _things._ "

"So, one of your brothers was injured? Where?" Zuckerman asked.

The creature stared at him for a second, jaw working, then barked out a harsh laugh. " _Everywhere._ We're _made_ of cracks, all of us, can't you _see?_ One wrong touch and we'll shatter, and then the others have to glue us back together until the next time."

"Jesus Christ," Redstone muttered.

Zuckerman rubbed his eyes. "We'll table that for now. Now, where did you come from? Some kind of lab? Were you trained by an opposing government? Who thought it would be a good idea to send you into combat situations with a _stick?"_

The turtle shrugged as much as he could in his restraints. "A mad man, a lost man, a man who died twice. No labs, no governments, not that I ever heard of but he was a bit of a pathological liar. He's gone now, can't ask him any questions. I don't think he liked me very much."

"Daddy issues. Of course it's got daddy issues," Redstone muttered.

"You're not helping," Zuckerman hissed. To the turtle, he said, "What I really care about are the two humans that have helped you and your freakshow family terrorize the United States government. Who are they?"

"Hmm? Oh, the girl is the person who almost destroyed the world, and the boy is the idiot I'm fucking."

Redstone spat out his coffee. " _What?"_

"I know, right? That's what I think every time I wake up covered in his drool. But he has such an _amazing_ come face."

Zuckerman let out a moan. "Okay, okay, borderline bestiality aside--"

"That's hurtful and inaccurate--"

"What are their actual _names?"_

The turtle cocked his head. "Names, names, names. The girl is: Princess, sky-breaker, Kraang-daughter, warrior, kuniochi, witch-lover, all-seeing. The boy is: warrior, beloved, sweetheart, battle-touched, half-mad, daredevil, lovely-- _aah!"_

"I meant their _real names_ , you fucking imbecile," Zuckerman growled. "The names we can use to track them down."

"Names..." the turtle hissed through gritted teeth, his brow clenched in obvious effort. "Their names. Are. Irrel-relevant."

The two men stared. "What?" Redstone said.

"Irrelevant. Unearned." The turtle was quivering in his restraints, but his voice didn't falter. "Names are precious things. They must be given freely, used wisely. Use them wrong and babies grow up into sad snakes, men turn into monsters, bad things happen."

"Oh, for the love of--this isn't working," Zuckerman moaned. "Shoot him up again." Redstone obliged, holding the turtle's head in a bruising grip as he pumped in another dose of the shiny purple stuff.

This time, the creature somehow managed to scream even louder, jittering and flopping like a fish out of water. Its eyes rolled over and over in its head, flickering between red-brown and white. It coughed up a bit of phlegm, and Zuckerman lurched back with a cry of disgust.

When the shaking finally subsided, Zuckerman grabbed the turtle by the chin and forced it to look at him. "Once more, with feeling: Who are the two sick fucks who betrayed their species to help you?"

The turtle stared at him for a second before saying slowly, carefully, as if each word had been wrenched from him: "I'm not allergic to peanut butter, but I can't eat it because I get nauseous thinking of all the people it's killed."

"You're shitting me," Zuckerman said.

"If I'm having a really bad day I pray to dead famous scientists to guidance. Occasionally I have flashbacks to that time I was disintegrated, where I can't move because I'm worried if I do I'll literally fall apart--" The creature gasped as Redstone hit him across the face.

"I don't understand," Zuckerman growled. "It's always worked before, why--"

"Sometimes, I stay up late working just so I can get away from my nightmares. I'm afraid of both my older brothers, because one feels too much and I'm worried the other one will stop feeling if he's not too careful. Now that I think of it, I have reasons to be afraid of almost everyone I love and they've got reasons to be afraid of me-- _aah!"_

The creature shook itself and keep talking. "Sometimes I'm worried that my kind is going to die out, and sometimes I'm worried that we're going to take over the earth. I don't want the earth. I don't want your mess. I can barely handle the responsibilities I have."

"Fuck it," Zuckerman moaned, standing upright. "Let's have the lab monkeys tear it open, see if we can get it to give us actual _answers_ that way."

"Do you think it might say something useful if we wait long enough?" Redstone asked curiously.

"Anything it has to say isn't worth playing therapist," said Zuckerman. "Give it a sedative and I'll call someone to haul it to the theater."

He turned away, starting to pull his phone out of his jacket, so he didn't hear what happened next. All he heard was a muffled shriek, a loud _snap,_ and a deafening _thump_.

By the time he spun around with a hand on his holster, it was already over. Redstone lay on the ground, his head lolling at a loose angle. The turtle stood pointing Redstone's gun at him. Its legs were shaking steady, but its grip was perfectly firm.

Zuckerman tensed, preparing to fire his own gun. "You'll never get out of here alive," he said quietly.

"You asked all the wrong questions," the turtle replied. "You didn't ask 'how are you going to get out of here, Donatello?' You didn't ask 'are you tugging on our clever little wires in all the right places every time we make you scream, Donatello?' You didn't ask 'did you plant a tracker in yourself and your loved ones so they would always be able to find each other, Donatello?'"

In the distance, there was a rumble and muffled gunfire.

"Right on cue," the turtle said, shaking its head in wonder. "It really is funny how things line up, isn't it? My brother once said our lives resemble a TV show. He might've been more right than I thought."

He sighed. "God, I sound like the Joker, don't I? Which makes you what, Batman? That's cool, that makes sense. You're the big, tough, white human male of indeterminate sexuality who tortures and hunts strange, ugly people. So you're Batman, and now the Joker has a gun on you. What do you do? Probably come with a fiendishly clever plan while I rant--so I'm going to stop ranting."

The turtle shot him in the chest, sending Zuckerman crashing against the wall. He felt his legs disappear, saw his hands twitch uselessly. He tried to speak and only a small groan emerged.

"If it makes you feel better," the creature said, standing over him. "I'm seriously going to embarrass myself in front of my siblings before this wears off. Cold comfort, I know, but you should take what you can get. I guess I'm also gonna be pretty severely traumatized, but that's not new for anyone in my family.""

From behind the barrel of the gun, the creature's eyes seemed rather sad. "I don't want to do this," it said. "Or at least I don't...think I do? It's hard to tell, what with the chemicals and electroshock. It doesn't matter, really. Even if I didn't say anything important, you saw me in a vulnerable position. You got a little glimpse of my soul, which mean you got a little glimpse of my brothers' souls, and I can't have that. Ever.

"So, bye."

The trigger clicked and the world exploded into white fire. 


	10. Jealousy

Spike--Slash, whatever--won't fall. No matter how many times Leo hits or cuts him, no matter how many times he tries to toss Slash off a roof or lure him into a narrow pipe, the bastard kept pressing on after him. Leo's only comfort is that he's managed to leave his injured brothers behind, that all of Slash's attention is fixed on him as they make their way through the sewers.

They're both covered in bruises and gashes, they both have broken bones, but Leo knows that he's starting get the worst of it. He's being carefully worn down--he _knows_ this, and he can't stop it from happening. The concrete has started to rock under his feet, exhaustion blurring his vision black at the edges.

And Slash. Won't. Stop. Talking.

Apparently there are endless reservoirs of breath in that big spiky body, because Slash is going on and on and _on_ about all the terrible things Raph has supposedly said regarding his own family. He uses ugly words, hateful words, words that burn like poison in Leo's ears.

He doesn't know why he's reacting like this. After all, he _knows_ that Slash is lying, or at the very least blowing things out of proportion. Raph doesn't feel this way about the others, certainly not about Leo. If he did, he would have said something. If he did, he would have done something. If he did...

"If Raph hated me that much," Leo pants, blinking blood out of his left eye. "He would have killed me himself."

Slash rolls his eyes. "That's the _problem,_ you stupid little cunt. Raph loves you guys almost as much as he hates ya. He thinks the hate cancels out the love. I'm here to show him otherwise." He swings the mace, and Leo barely manages to dodge out of the way.

"It's _twisted_ , that's what it is," Slash growls as Leo rolls to his feet. "All that hate, mixed with all that love. For you, especially--disgusting."

" _Disgusting?"_ Leo asks, charging him with his remaining sword raised high. "We're brothers!"

Slash grabs the blade in one massive fist. "Raph doesn't love ya like a brother."

Leo's brain stops working for a second, and that's all the time Spike needs to rip the blade from his hands before snapping it in two. Leo ducks a bloody punch and skids between Slash's legs, dragging a knife across the big turtle's thighs. The skin down there is thicker than it is for Leo, however, and Slash doesn't even stumble as Leo jumps upright.

"You're wrong," Leo gasps, dancing out of Slash's reach. He manages to force his bruised month into a smirk. "I thought you were lying before, but now I just think you're delusional."

"He says your name when he jerks off," Slash says, making a grab for Leo's bandana.

"Bullshit," Leo snarls, throwing his knife at Slash's eye. The big turtle twitches to the side at the last minute and the knife bounces off one of his spikes, skittering away into the darkness.

"He has fantasies about ya," Slash growls, backing Leo towards the wall. "He told me all about 'em. He wants to sneak into your bedroom while ya sleep, tie ya up, show you who's _really_ boss in the family."

"He wouldn't," Leo says fiercely. No matter how much they fight, he knows that his brother would never want to hurt him that way. He _knows._

"He wants to," Slash says, looming over him. "But what _really_ makes me sick is that he has fantasies of you doing that _to_ him, too. He thinks you've got it in you to _top,_ can you believe that?"

Leo steps backwards up the wall and leaps, flipping over to the far side of the tunnel and grabbing a jagged hilt. "You're wrong," he repeats, because he doesn't know what else to say. He doesn't understand why this is happening, why Slash is saying such things. He's only got the vaguest idea of what "topping" even _means._

"I wish I was," Slash tells him, sounding sad. "It's pathetic, it's _unhealthy_ , loving someone ya hate, and he _knows_ it. He told me that, too, Only he thinks it's all _his_ fault, can you believe that? He's fucking miserable and he can't admit that he wouldn't be happier if _you_ weren't slutting around all the time."

 _"No one's_ at fault here," Leo insists, scanning for an opening. "If you can just go back and _talk_ to Raph about whatever you're feel--"

"RAPH DOESN'T DESERVE YOU!" Slash screams, charging him. Leo dodges, but his ears are still ringing from that scream, and Slash's fist grazes his leg. It's Slash, so that "graze" is enough to send him staggering off balance with a yelp.

"He needs someone stronger, someone _better,_ " Slash says as Leo scrambles away, trying to avoid his stomping feet. "He needs someone who can actually take care of him."

 _Oh no._ "Are you...are you in love with my brother?" Leo asks, staggering to his feet. _Please please please let me be wrong._

"He's mine," Slash says happily. "And I'm his. He knows that, too even if he's being weird about it."

"You'll never touch him," Leo hisses. _"Never."_

"You won't fuck him, so no else can either?" Slash growls. "Fucking typical."

"That's not what I--" But Leo has to save his breathe as he dodges and weaves, frantically avoiding Slash's attempts to crush his head. The jagged edge of the broken sword opens bright cuts on the big turtle's knuckles, but it's not enough, never enough.

"Raph loves ya, even though you're in love with that Foot dyke he hates so much," Slash roars. He's moving faster than ever--or is Leo slowing down? He's lost so much blood, he's so tired, and adrenaline can't keep him up forever.

"He loves ya even though he _knows_ , he told me, that you're a faggy," a glancing blow to the plastron sends Leo spinning, "whiny," sharp spikes rip open the back of his neck, "self-absorbed," he slices Slash's arm open and the big turtle doesn't seem to notice, "dorky," Leo's knocked off his feet as Slash stomps the ground in front off him, "ass-kissing," the sword hilt is kicked out of his hands, "useless," he tries to sit up and his head clonks against unforgiving plastron, "fucked-up," Slash grabs his wrists in one massive hand, "little _bitch."_ Leo's slammed against the stone as Slash looms over him, eyes glittering.

Leo blinks up at him, trying to focus through the pain and fear and his blood-spattered vision. "If you do this," he whispers, spitting red, "Raph will never forgive you, no matter what his feelings are."

Slash raises a fist--and then he pauses, frowning. "Ya know," he says thoughtfully. "You might actually be right, for once."

Leo stares, hardly daring to hope.

"I won't kill ya."

And then a hand slips between his legs.

"I'll just ruin ya instead."

The world flickers white for a second. "No," Leo breathes. "No, no no _no!"_ He won't let that happen, he can't, he'll kill himself before letting his honor be stolen like that.

"Oh _yes,"_ Slash comes, now reaching between his own legs and starting to rub. "I'll show ya to him--I'll show ya to _all_ of them, a dirty, beaten, broken _whore._ Raph'll never want to touch ya again."

"Slash, you're not well," Leo begs, trying not to cry, trying not to pass out. "It's just the mutagen, Slash, please..."

"Shuddup," Slash says. "If you want to keep your pretty little teeth, use your mouth for somethin' worthwhile." He grunts and drops down, cock hitting Leo's chest with a painful _thump._ Slash grins. "Like that?"

Leo doesn't like it at all. In fact, he throws up all over it.

"You little _shit!"_ Slash howls, squeezing Leo's arms together with one hand and frantically cleaning himself off with the other. "I'm going to rip your fucking tail off for that!"

Leo shrieks as he feels his bones grind together. Slash is wrenching his legs apart and he'll die if that thing gets inside him, he knows he will...

"Careful," a familiar voice calls. They both glance over to see Raph leaning against the wall, a strange smile on his face. "Wouldn't want to break him too quickly. He might still be fun."

"Ra-Raph?" Leo gasps out.

"Shut up," Raph says, kicking him in the head as he walks by. Leo yelps, his tender scalp throbbing. Raph snickers. "I can't _believe_ I mooned after you for so long."

"Oh baby," he murmurs, drawing near to Slash. "You didn't have to try so hard to get my attention."

Slash lurches to his feet, looking thrown off balance. "What?"

"You really think I could have kept my eyes on that piece of shit when I had you around?" Raph asks, standing on his tiptoes to caress Slash's face. "I wanted you from the moment I saw what you had become. I was just too scared to ask."

"You--you mean it?" Slash says, glancing at Leo. "You're not just saying that to protect him?"

"He's just a freaky little fuckup. They all are," Raph says. "I don't have love for him anymore, just hate. That's why I want to give the killing blow myself. Then we can go back and do the others, nice and slow." Leo whimpers at the words.

"But first," Raph lifts his arms and Slash obediently scoops him up. "Show me just how much you love me, beautiful." He wraps his legs around the bigger turtle's waist as Slash gently pushes him up against the wall. Their lips meets in a passionate kiss, and Leo blinks bloody tears from his eyes at the sight.

So he almost misses the moment when Raph grabs the sai from his belt and rams it through Slash's eye with a soft _squelch._

Slash groans as he topples backward, pierced through to the brain. Raph gracefully rolls off of him and watches as he twitches in his death throes. "Bye, Spike," he whispers sadly.

Then he turns back to Leo, who flinches away with a painful yelp.

"No, no, it's okay!" Raph says frantically, dropping down by his side. That strange smile is gone, replaced by eyes wide with fear and horror. "Oh, God, Leo...I didn't mean it. I didn't mean any of it, I swear on my _life_. I just had to get him away from you..."

He gently gathers Leo up in his arms and sprints down the tunnel. "I love you," he whispers, breath warm in Leo's ear. "I love you all. It was always you, Leo, never him. No one will ever hurt you ever again, I _swear._ I love you so much."

Leo looks up into his brother's bright, fierce green eyes and finally sees something that makes sense on this horrible night. "Okay," he says quietly, and passes out.


	11. King

Their brother hadn't recognized them--or rather, they had only brought bad memories. And everything had changed.

"He wants to see you." Donnie glanced up to see Mira waiting in the doorway, looking nervous in her black uniform.

Donnie rubbed his photoreceptors with a groan. "Again?"

"It's been, like, a week since the last time."

Donnie would have blinked if he could. "Seriously?" He'd used to lose track of time back when he was ~~alive~~ a mutant, but now that he was a robot running on brand new fuel cells (provided by Leo's forces, still stained with a bit of blood) sleep had become a memory, and it was harder to pace himself.

"Seriously. Now, come on. You know how he gets."

Donnie knew all too well how his brother "got," so he headed out of his lab with a mechanical sigh.

They made their way through the walls of their new home, an abandoned military base they had found buried deep in the heart of the Green Paradise. Donnie thought that the experiments performed here might have helped preserve this place when so much had been destroyed, and had been refiling through their files trying to find a means of expanding the process. It would also extend Leo's rule...but it was better than the brutal methods of population control he might resort to if they started running out of land. 

Mira chattered on about the new moves she'd been learning in class. That was one of Leo's most cunning plays: collecting promising orphans and training them into a small, effective ninja force. It bore a disturbing resemblance to what their own father had done with them, albeit on a larger scale...not to mention that these children were being trained to kill.

Mira seemed to be adjusting well, and Donnie wasn't bitter about that. She had reached the Green Paradise, she had a new tribe, she had a purpose in life. A bit of freedom was a small price to pay, considering all the pain and loneliness freedom had brought her. Donnie suspected that she didn't quite get why he and his brothers weren't adapting as well, not that he could ever explain it to her.

As they passed by a window, Donnie could see the movements of Leo's soldiers--the few he had considered worthy of following them to the Oasis--moving among the shadows of the barracks. Beyond them, he could see the fields where they had started growing crops, hastened by Donnie's homemade fertilizer. Even farther, he thought he might glimpse the outline of enemy fires.

The slaughter in the gorge had drawn attention, of course, and Karai's forces had been snapping at their borders for a while. Donnie wasn't sure if she knew of Maximus Kong's true identity, or if she cared.

All he knew was that Leo expected him to build weapons for his forces, and that Mikey or Mira would be expected to test out every single one, so there was no chance of sabotage. Karai was probably going to lose this war, would probably die as a result, and Donnie would definitely have a hand in it.

The worst part was that he didn't completely hate his new work, because Leo didn't always force him to make engines of death. There was the fertilizer, for example, along with medical and construction equipment. There was a war vehicle that Donnie caught himself calling the "Shellraiser 2.0" in his head, even though Leo was certainly be the only turtle who would ever ride in it.

"Can you tell Red Stripe I said hi?" Mira asked, breaking Donnie out of his thoughts.

"Of course," he replied. He didn't have the heart to tell her that Leo wouldn't let him speak to Raph, probably wouldn't let him speak at all. _Silvertongue,_ he called him. _You tell stories that should be forgotten._

They had reached the entrance to his brother's throne room. There were no guards; Leo didn't need guards. Mira opened the door with a creak and watched Donnie enter. She didn't glance in; she didn't like seeing what the others had been reduced to. "See you later," she said, closing the door quickly, but quietly. And Donnie was left alone with his family.

"Heeeey, dude," Mikey crooned from his cage, tapping his feet cheerfully against the floor of his cage as he hugged Ice Cream Kitty to his chest. One look at his dopey grin and blown-out pupils, and Donnie knew that Leo had drugged him again. He'd started doing it in the early days, when Mikey would bang his head against the bars. The Oasis was full of weird little plants, plants that were slowly taking Mikey away from Donnie--away from this nightmare.

Leo watched them from atop his throne, wearing a simpler version of his elaborate battle armor. It actually looked a lot like the stuff he'd worn when he was fighting the Foot alongside Karai, a fact that that depressed Donnie to no end. There was a look of calm expectation in his glowing eyes.

Raph knelt at his side, back straight and eyes staring blankly at nothing, an increasingly familiar look for him even though Leo wasn't giving him any drugs. There was a collar around his throat, attached to a chain whose other end was held loosely in Leo's right hand. As he approached, Donnie could make out a fresh bite mark on Raph's shoulder, a vicious red--the only red Raph was allowed to wear anymore.

Of all their positions in this new world order, Raph's was definitely the worst.

"Sing," Leo said suddenly, breaking the silence. Donnie nodded and started playing one of his audio files: a New Age mix. If Leo noticed the breathtaking irony of his continued preference for this genre, he never said anything.

The soothing sounds filled the room and Leo leaned back, eyes sliding closed as he gently petted the top of Raph's head. Donnie thought Raph might have leaned, ever so slightly, into the touch, but decided he was going to pretend he hadn't seen that in the interest of his own mental health.

Donnie had started playing these audio files when they were first captured, in the hopes that they might trigger Leo's memories. If they had, it wasn't enough to make him let them go, but he liked making Donnie "sing" for him. In his cage, Mikey hummed along and stroked Ice Cream Kitty's fur.

Raph shifted in his shackles, making himself comfortable. Donnie thought he might be able to break out of them if he tried, the way he'd done before, but Leo had always beaten the shit out of him. Raph didn't try to escape as often these days.

Donnie had never tried to escape at all. Not with Mikey locked up, not with Raph almost constantly bound to Leo's side. Freeing one might mean abandoning the other, and even if they all escaped they risked leaving Mira to Leo's forces.

The only hope they had of truly getting away was if Donnie managed to kill Leo, and that wasn't possible. Even after all he'd done, they were still brothers. Donnie would never kill one of his own flesh and blood (he was pretty sure Leo felt the same, considering that he'd kept Mikey alive despite his near-total uselessness).

Besides...Donnie wasn't sure he _could_ kill his brother, even if he wanted to. Even if he hit him in the chest with a blast from a laser cannon.

He'd seen the way Leo had torn through the crowd of Honey Badgers and Scale Tails that day in the gorge, until the sands ran red around their feet. He hadn't needed a weapon, really; he _was_ the weapon.

Chompy had tried to take him down at one point, and Leo had simply ripped him apart. The sight had broken something in Raph, Donnie thought, something that would never be right again.

Afterwards, Leo had stood in front of them, stained with blood, and announced that they belonged to him. When Verminator Rex had protested, Leo had simply torn his throat out. Then he'd taken Mira's map and led them to the Green Place, started building his brutal little kingdom in the world's last safe place.

Donnie had to admit that his brother was a competent ruler, if by no means a gentle one. He was good at balancing brutal control and cunning manipulation; he made sure to keep his forces from wreaking havoc in the Oasis and he took good care of his young students. Not to mention that from what Donnie had seen of his brother's battles with Karai, he'd lost none of his head for strategy.

He'd lost plenty of other things, though.

Leo tugged on the chain, and Raph stood to climb obediently into his lap. Donnie's audio stuttered at the sight, but Leo shot him a look and he kept going.

 _Please_ , Raph had begged when Leo first put the collar on him. _Don't do this._ _We're your brothers. We love you._

 _If you love me,_ Leo had said, a look of genuine confusion in his eyes, _you'll stay with me and let me keep you safe._

That was the cruel thing. Leo _did_ remember the world before, at least in bits and pieces. He remembered the bad things, the cruel things: being beaten by the Shredder, Raph's brain worm, Mikey almost drowning, the times Sensei had hurt them, the times they'd gone hungry down in the sewers, the planet's destruction. He remembered April disintegrating Donnie, but couldn't quite process the fact that she'd been their friend.

 _I want to protect you,_ he'd insisted. _You kept running away all the time. Now I'll never lose you again._

Leo planted a soft kiss on Raph's neck, then another. His hand moved up and down their brother's plastron, touching and stroking. Raph gazed into Donnie's photoreceptors, his hands hanging limply at his sides.

Donnie reminded himself to not stop playing. If he refused to sing, Leo would hurt Raph. He didn't want his brother to get hurt, and he definitely didn't want to find out if Raph would take the beating with that same dead expression.

 _I've been forgetting again,_ Raph had confessed at his last medical checkup, as Donnie attended to the bruises on his thighs. _It's easier, when I forget. It feels good when he's with me. And then I come back and I hate myself. What do I do?_ Donnie had told him to keep remembering, even if he wasn't sure that that was the right answer. After all, so many of his brother's memories were of terrible things.

Raph had screamed in the beginning, screamed and begged and tried to kill himself. He'd asked Donnie to end him at the first checkup, but Donnie hadn't been able to. Raph had said that he would always hate him for that.

There hadn't been a suicide attempt in a long while. Four years, eighty-eight days, thirteen hours, sixteen minutes, and twenty-five seconds of being your brother's slave can change a person.

In the corner, Mikey tapped the bars of his cage in time with the beat. "We should take Donnie Bunny on the road," he told Ice Cream Kitty, twirling a strand of his hair. "We'd make a mint, I'm sure."

They'd all tried so hard to remind Leo of the good times, in the early days. He'd just shaken his head, over and over again: _it didn't last. We weren't safe. How could we be happy when we weren't safe? I had terrible nightmares, I'd put a gag in my mouth to block out the screams. I was in pain all the time after what the Shredder did, I just didn't tell you. Now I feel better._

In a fit of desperation, Donnie had once mentioned how Splinter would be disappointed, and Leo had dangled him out a window. _That rodent was just another monster. I want you all to forget him._

Raph and Leo's breaths were getting heavier now. This was peculiar; sometimes Leo had taken Raph in front of them, but usually as punishment for somebody's rebellion. Donnie could switch off his audio, but Leo could tell if he deactivated his photoreceptors and would forbid it. As a result, the images of Raph screaming in pain, pleasure, or both had been ingrained in his hard drive.

Right now Raph looked relaxed, he might even have been smiling a little. He curled up against Leo's chest as they touched each other, not seeming to notice that Donnie was there.

Donnie realized that Raph was breaking, the way Mikey was breaking, the way Mira had quietly broken and Donnie himself was starting to break. Leo had broken long before any of them, and reassembled his pieces into something strange and ugly.

And yet...as Donnie listened to Raph letting out a soft moan, it dawned on him that things really hadn't changed that much. Leo was still their leader, the one they looked up to, the one who would do anything to protect them no matter the cost.

All of the differences, really, stemmed from the fact that Leo had transformed himself from a simple leader into a king--someone who demanded rewards for his sacrifices, someone who crushed defiance inside and out of the circle.

That iron control, that ferocity...it hadn't come from the mutagen bomb. It had been growing long before that. Their brother had always dark seeds in him, one that had just been nurtured in the heat of his second transformation.

Leo still loved them, but love can start to mean strange things at the end of the world. Sometimes, loving someone just makes it easier to break them.

Raph and Leo climaxed, and lay slumped together as Donnie reached the end of his file. By the time he was done, Raph had already drifted off to sleep, his breath's smooth and easy in his brother's arms.

"Come," Leo said, rising to his feet with Raph cradled to his chest. Donnie followed him into the bedchamber, listening to Mikey's babbles fade into silence.

He watched as Leo gently lowered Raph onto the massive bed, removing his shackles and hooking his collar into the wall. Leo set about removing his armor, lowering down at their brother with a tender expression.

"What did you do to him?" Donnie asked quietly. "Why is he like that? Why...why doesn't he care when you touch him anymore?"

Leo shrugged his massive shoulders. "I gave him rewards when he was good and punishment when he was bad," he said. "And then I did it a lot. I was very patient."

He looked up at Donnie, his eyes bright and piercing. "I want him to have my children, one day," he said. "Can you do that?"

Donnie started. "I...he's a _male_ turtle."

Leo shrugged. "Can you?"

Donnie looked down. "What will you do if I say no?" He really didn't want to help one brother knock up the other, especially if it meant turning whatever Leo was building here into a goddamn dynasty.

"I will remember that you are capable of great things, Silvertongue, more than most people could imagine. And remind you what happens to liars." His hand tensed on Raph's shoulder, ever so slightly, a warning.

Donnie sighed. "I'll...I'll work at it."

"Good." To Donnie's surprise, Leo stood up and left him alone with Raph.

"Raph?" Donnie asked, prodding his brother. "Raph, are you okay?"

"G'way," Raph muttered, pushing at him. His eyes flickered, glassy and dull. "F'rgt again, don't want t'remember. Wanna feel good."

Donnie's mechanical shoulders slumped. "I don't want to remember either," he admitted.

Before he could decide what to say next, Leo returned, with a snoring Mikey in his arms and Ice Cream Kitty on his shoulder. Donnie stared at he tucked them in with Raph. "It's been a long time since we slept together," Leo explained. "I thought it might be nice."

"You want me to get in with you?" Donnie asked. "What if I steal them away in the night?"

Leo shrugged. "I'll hear you, probably. But you won't take them, because you can't protect them on your own and you have no place else to go, because you don't know if the meerkat will want to leave with you, because you don't know if _they'll_ want to leave with you. And that's one of the few questions you don't want answered."

"We don't want a master, or a king," Donnie said firmly, hoping he sounded more confident than he felt. "We want a brother."

"You had a brother," Leo replied simply. "It was a disaster. Now, come on, get in."

Donnie sighed, because Leo was wrong about some things, but right about so many others, and he was starting to get the right and the wrong confused. He was starting to get lots of things confused.

He powered down, felt Leo folding him into bed besides them. His hard metal body should have been uncomfortable, but Leo didn't complain as he tucked Donnie up under his left arm, the softest and most suffocating restraint Donnie had ever felt. His photoreceptors flickered out, and the darkness claimed them all.


	12. Lost

April made her way into the Lair, ears pricked for the turtles' voices. She could hear Raph talking to Spike in his room, Leo training with his father in the dojo, Donnie muttering to himself as he worked on Metalhead, and Mikey singing as he waltzed with Ice Cream Kitty.

"Hey, April!" Mikey called when he saw her. "Guys, April's here!" She watched them emerge into the Pit, all smiling at her. They looked happy, relaxed, comfortable, and her shoulders slumped at the sight.

"What's wrong, Ape?" Raph asked, feeding Spike a leaf as the smaller turtle perched on his shoulder."You don't look so good."

She shrugged. "You've got Spike," she told him.

Raph frowned. "Yeah, I've got Spike, I've always got Spike. So?"

"And Mikey has Ice Cream Kitty," April said. "Even though Spike got mutated weeks before I got you that cat."

They all stared at her.

"Are you...feeling all right, April-Kun?" Splinter finally asked.

Donnie crossed to her and put his hand on her forehead. "Did you have a fever?" He was so relaxed when he touched her, not the slightest hint of tension, in a way that he hadn't been since Za-Naron.

"No, I...fuck," she groaned, rubbing her head.

"Whoa, April said a swear!" Mikey said, his voice bright even as his eyes darted uncertainly.

"Can you all come over here?" she asked, making her way over to the TV. "It might go easier if I show you." They followed her, exchanging confused looks. Splinter's ear was twitching slightly and the sight made her heart hurt.

"Look," she snapped her fingers and they all gasped as the TV clicked on. On the screen were four turtles slumped in elaborate metal chairs, broken headsets dangling next to their heads. A redhead girl in black sat in front of them, legs crossed and head bowed, hands resting on her knees. In the distance they could hear the muffled sound of guns going off and swords clanging.

"Wait, is that _us?"_ Raph asked, blinking.

"It can't be," Donnie said, shaking his head and tapping his fingers anxiously on his thighs. "Look...look how much older they are, how beat-up. They're not us."

"You four were kidnapped by Tiger Claw, and he put you in some kind of machine built by Stockman," April told them. "Karai, Casey, Shinigami, and I tracked you down and busted you out, but you were still catatonic. There's no way we can carry you all out of here, especially not in the middle of a fight, so I entered your heads to get you to wake up."

They all stared at her some more. Mikey let out a burst of nervous laughter and stepped so that the couch was between him and April.

"April-Kun," Splinter said, approaching her cautiously, paws raised. "I am not exactly sure what has happened to the television, but I think it would best if you would sit down and let Donatello examine you."

His hand touched her shoulder and froze instantly, grey stone racing up his fingers and across his body. In an instant, he was a statue.

"FATHER!" Leo wailed, jumping to his feet and shoving April aside. "Get away from him!" He frantically patted Splinter up and down, searching for a pulse. "What did you _do?"_ he snarled, glaring at her through eyes full of tears.

"Nothing," April told him sadly. "I didn't have to do anything. He's not supposed to be here."

He stumbled away from her, stepping protectively in front of Raph and Mikey and drawing his swords. "I don't know what you are, or what you did with the real April O'Neil," he growled, "but you need to fix what you've done and get away from us, now, or suffer the consequences."

"There's no _time_ for that," she burst out desperately. "Look, I have no idea what you're feeling right now, or what memories the VR left you with, but we have to--"

"It's not VR."

They all turned to Donnie, who had remained hunched over on the couch. He looked up at them, and April could see that his eyes were full of tears--but also growing clarity.

"That," he pointed to the ring of chairs on screen, "was a torture device, plan and simple." April's heart caught in her throat.

"Donnie...?" Leo asked cautiously. The other three turtles backed away from him and April.

"They hooked up our minds, created some kind of telepathic link so that we could experience each other's fear and pain. When one of us was hurt, we'd all feel it, physically and mentally, only it would be reflected between our brains-- _amplified."_ He gave a bitter laugh. "It was ingenious, really. I remember Stockman snickering about it, how good it felt to make us torture each other."

"No," said Leo, shaking his head wildly. "That didn't happen, I wouldn't _let_ it. Splinter wouldn't let it happen."

Donnie didn't--couldn't--look at him. "They had it turned up to the point that a slap felt like a punch, a cut felt like a stab, a burn felt like a bullet wound, electrocution felt like an inferno." The bottom had dropped out of April's stomach, and the others' faces were growing whiter.

"How many broken fingers does Leo have, by the way?" Donnie asked. "I think they focused most of the physical torture on him. I remember...two, at least?" Leo shot a panicked look at his undamaged hands.

"Three," April said faintly.

Donnie nodded. "There was psychological torture, too. Mocking us with memories of our screw-ups, our losses, threatening to rape or mutilate us. We...God, we can barely handle that stuff on a _normal_ day, personally I preferred electrocu--"

"Donnie!" Raph had crossed to Donnie and dropping in front of him, shaking his shoulders. "Donnie, you gotta snap out of it man, that didn't happen..."

"Where's Spike?" Donnie asked him quietly.

"Spike?" Raph looked down at his shoulder, but the little turtle was gone. "Spike! _Spike!"_ He jumped to his feet and lurched away from Donnie, frantically slapping at himself as if Spike had somehow gotten lost in his belt. Master Splinter's statue started to crumble, and Mikey whimpered at the sight.

"We _beat_ them, though," said Donnie, a faint light of triumph in his eyes. "We figured it out. We couldn't talk telepathically or anything, but we could pushed our minds together as best we could even thought it hurt, and then we just...left. We lost ourselves in our own heads on purpose, to stay sane. It was Leo's idea, but we built _this..._ " He waved at the Lair around them. "...together. Too well, really. It hadn't even occurred to me that something was wrong until you showed up, April."

Mikey let out a small wail and collapsed in on himself, shaking. "Oh _no,_ " he sobbed as Leo gathered him in his arms. "No no no, I don't want to remember, I wanna forget..."

"We all did," Donnie said. "I still do, really, but..." he tapped the side of his head. "Eidetic memory. It wasn't going to hold for long."

As if to punctuate--or maybe because of--his words, there was a faint rumble in the distance. The ceiling shook ever so slightly over their heads, chips of plaster raining down.

"It's breaking," Donnie said quietly, rising to his feet. "We're breaking." In the corner, Leo let out a loud groan and threw up as Mikey started rocking back and forth. Raph pressed his shell against a wall and lurched over, head in his hands.

"I'm sorry, guys," April said, letting the tears trickle down her cheeks as she went to help Mikey and Leo to her feet. "I really am, but...you can't break down, not until later. Not until we're safe. But we can help you afterwards--me and Casey and Shini and Karai--just as you've always helped us. We can do that."

"I don't want to go," Mikey said, clutching his head. "Can't you just bring the others in with us? We could all stay here together, we could forget again, we could be happy..."

"It wouldn't be real life," Leo quietly, staring at his feet. "Just a living death." He sniffled, wiping his nose. "April's right, guys. We've got to get out of here."

Moving slowly and stiffly, Donnie walked over to Raph and started tugging him into the center of the room. "Come on," he said. They could hear walls crashing down.

The five mutants gathered in the center of the rapidly disintegrating living room and locked hands, holding each other up. "It's going to hurt," Mikey said quietly.

"I know," Leo murmured.

"Are...are we going to kill Stockman and Tiger Claw? So they can't do this again?"

Leo shrugged. "Maybe."

"Splinter wouldn't have wanted that," Donnie said half-heartedly. The statue finished crumbling behind him, and no one bothered to make a verbal rejection of his point.

"It's going to be okay," April promised them, hoping she was right. She squeezed their hands. "I love you guys."

"We love you, too," Raph said, and the ceiling crashed down on them.


	13. Mirror

The piece of red cloth slips out of Raphael's clumsy fingers, slithering down his shell. "Shit," he mutters, trying and failing to grab it before it hurts the floor. This is his third time trying to get the stupid thing on, and each one has ended in failure.

He doesn't understand _why_ they have to wear these things; they look ridiculous, like the stuff worn by brain-fried hipsters Raphael sometimes met on the streets. _It is a symbol of our clan, our bond,_ the rat had said when he handed it over. Raphael had bit back the urge to reply that _being fucking freaks of nature is a pretty strong symbol of our bond._ The rat's in charge of this place, after all, even though he walks around in a goddamn bathrobe and watches soap operas unironically.

Raphael doesn't want to push his luck. That's one reason, besides pride, that he hasn't called anyone in here to help. He may be their so-called brother _,_ sure, but he's got a long way to go before he's a real member of this group, with all their shared experiences and struggles. The last thing he wants to do is come across as incompetent.

"Need any help?"

Then again, when has what he wanted ever mattered to the universe?

The one with the swords, Leon or something ( _Leonardo,_ right, supposedly not named after the actor although it's not like they can ask the chick who named him), is leaning in the doorway. He regards Raphael seemingly without judgement, although if there's one thing Raphael's learned about him so far is that the guy has an epic poker face.

"I'm fine," he mutters, turning away. Instantly a spurt of panic rushes through him--Leonardo seems to be a bit of a big guy around here, the closest thing Splinter has to a second-in-command. Will Raphael get in trouble for turning his back on him?

But Leonardo just says, "Do you want me to show you how to do it?"

"Mikey showed me yesterday," Raphael says. He had, although he'd also talked a mile a minute and kept switching subjects, going on about some guy named Woody who apparently gave them free food ( _free_ food? What the fuck? And who the hell calls themselves _Woody_?) or the shit he'd seen on TV.

"Sometimes, it takes a little while to figure out," Leonardo says. "Come on, I think we've got a mirror back here. We can work on it together."

Since he's apparently not going to get kicked out for the crime of fucking up ninja fashion, Raphael follows the other turtle down the hall. Leonardo walks with the same pantherlike grace he puts into training with his swords, his movements quick and light. Raphael feels like a rolling boulder next to him, next to all of them.

There is, in fact, a mirror buried in this weird little underground warren. Leonardo dusts its off and pulls up a stool, gesturing for Raphael to sit. He does, even if he feels like a ten-year-old girl whose friend is trying to braid her hair.

Leonardo picks up the mask and gently wraps it around his head. "Can you see in the mirror?" he asks, and surprisingly Raph can; the mask doesn't restrict his peripheral vision as much as he feared. "Okay, I'm going to talk you through it, and then I'm going to guide your hands while you do it. That's how Sensei taught me."

As he starts to fold the knot, his fingers brush against the back of Raph's head and--

_"Stop squirming," his older brother insists, running a comb through his wet black hair as they sit by a babbling brook. There's a woman who usually does this, but she's not there, and he doesn't want to think about her._

_"Hurts," he mutters, even though it doesn't, not really, but he likes annoying his brother._

_"It'll hurt a lot more if I let knots form. Now, hold still--"_

"--Are you listening to me?"

"Huh?" _Shit._ He'd zoned out after Leonardo had put in the effort to teach him such a simple thing, and over such a weird little whatever-it-was. Did that count as a sign of disrespect? They were big on respect around here, he knew that much. Is as Leonardo mad at him? Will he punished?

"It's okay," Leonardo says, putting a soothing hand on his shoulder. Raphael glances in the mirror and winces at the sight of his own panicked expression. "I can go through it again." His voice and postures are totally relaxed, and slowly Raphael lets himself calm down.

And he does, never yanking too hard or sounding angry. His hands are gentle on Raphael's as he guides them into the correct positions over and over again, until he finally, _finally_ manages to get it right. Leonardo has him do it again a few more times, and eventually it feels as natural as breathing.

They regard each other in the mirror, and it dawns on Raphael just how similar their faces and bodies look. Something about the tilt of the head, the curve of the jaw...there's a likeness there that goes beyond the whole "both mutant turtles" thing. The similarity is even stronger now that they're both wearing such calm expressions.

"Thanks, Leonardo," Raphael says. He hasn't thanked anyone for anything since Buck, and the feeling is bittersweet.

"You're welcome, Raph," says the other turtle--his _brother_. "And you can call me Leo."

Leo and Raph. They sound better than Leonardo and Raphael, more personalized. More intimate.

He smiles into the mirror, and both turtles smile back.


	14. Nightmares

Raph is running. His feet pound on unforgiving stone, bare of their wrappings. The streets of New York, once so familiar, warp into a dark and twisted funhouse mirror around him, allies gaping like maws as he crashes and bounces off buildings.

"Where are you going, Raphie?" The voice rings in his ears, smooth as honey and cold as ice. No matter how far or fast Raph runs, Leo is always only a few steps behind him, dragging his blades along the stone to make an endless _shriek_ that burns his brain.

"Lemme alone," he growls, but his voice is shaking so hard that's impossible to sound threatening.

"Now, you know I can't do that, Raphie. You've been bad, and you need to be punished." He tries to scramble up a wall, but his hands slip and tear on the crumbling brick.

"I haven't _done_ anything!" he shrieks. Has he? He doesn't remember. His head is full of holes, has been ever since he woke up in that alley.

His brother clicks his tongue. "Are you a little liar, too, then? _Look_ at yourself, Raphie. You can't hide the truth from me."

Raph looks down at himself, wanting to say there's nothing wrong with him...but there is. He's covered in blood, bright and terrible as a scarlet letter. It coats his sai, streaks his face, sinks into the cracks of his plastron, forms veritable gloves around his hands.

He drops to his knees with a cry of horror. "W-what did I...? Who...?"

"Everything," his brother coos, coming up behind him. "And everyone. It's just you and me left, Raphie. Didn't you know, deep down, that this was always how it would end?"

"No..." he moans, rocking back and forth. "No no _no,_ I didn't mean to..." He can't, he wouldn't, he's not a monster, he's _not..._

Leo's standing over him now, a blade tip lifting his chin. "You never mean to, Raphie," he says, his sad voice belied by his mocking smile. "But you do it anyway, do you? That's all you are, Raphie, a nasty little beast from the gutter. Can't take orders, can't control itself. We made _such_ a mistake taking you in..."

"I'm _sorry,"_ Raph weeps, frantically scrubbing his hands as if that could make the terrible blood go away. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, _please."_

"No more chances, Raphie," Leo chides. The blade twitches, drawing a line of acid across Raph's skin. "You couldn't process my lessons any other way, so I guess I'll just to carve them into you."

The blade slashes him again and again, all over, a terrible steel metronome. "Bit by bit by bit," Leo murmurs over his agonized weeping. "I'll break you down, Raphie, bit by bit."

There's blood staining Raph's face, and then it's tears, and he's quietly sobbing into his pillow. He just lies there for a while, shaking.

After a while, he pushes himself to his feet and goes to grab some free weights. He won't be going back to sleep tonight, but there's no need to lie around being a pussy about it.

It's a just a dream, after all. Just a _fucking_ dream.

Leo is creeping through the sewer tunnels, swords raised. There's an enemy sneaking up on him. although he can't see them. He knows there's an enemy, though. There always is.

And then he hears his brothers screaming, and stealth flies out the window. He sprints through the dark, shouting their names, but he can't find them. They're everywhere and nowhere all at once, and it's _maddening_.

The screams rise, frantically crying out his name or just shrieking with incoherent agony. He can hear other sounds mixed in, too: mocking laughter, breaking bones, rushing water, the hiss of acid or fire, the _rip_ of tearing skin. And then the absolute worst noises of all: grunts of pleasure from unfamiliar throats, followed with the unmistakable rhythm of flesh slapping flesh.

Leo wants to reach through his ear slits and tear out his auditory nerves, but he can't. He needs to find them, keep them safe, that's his _job_ , his reason for being.

"Have you lost something, my son?"

It's the Monster, the massive rat created by Kitsune and the Rat King, the dark ugly thing he glimpsed in his father's eyes when Darius Dun died. It stands in front of him, tail swishing merrily across the stone, teeth glittering bone-white.

"Where are they?" Leo growls, hefting his swords. The not-father's tail snaps across his arms like a whip, painful and terrible, and he drops them with a howl of pain.

"Such disrespect," the Monster muses, turning away. "And here I thought you couldn't sink any lower."

Panic sizzles in his veins. "No, wait!" Leo cries, staggering after him. "Please, I'm sorry, just tell me where they are, please..."

The Monster turns back, cracking its whip across Leo's legs once, twice, three times before letting him crash to the ground with a scream. "You would ask questions of _me,_ you ungrateful brat?" it roars. "After turning your back on me, after spitting in the face of all my gifts, after failing time and time again when I tried to mold you into a competent warrior?"

"I'm sorry," Leo wails, bowing and scraping. "I'll do anything, please just tell me where..." The sounds of his brothers' suffering rings through the air, a thousand daggers in his heart and head.

A cruel light enters the Monster's eyes. " _Anything?_ " It shrugs off the maroon robe, giving Leo an eye-level view of its dark erection. "Prove it, then."

Nausea boils in his stomach, and Leo instinctively shrinks away. The rat sighs, shaking its head. "You really don't care about them, do you? I should have known, from such a two-faced--"

"No, no, I'll do it," Leo whimpers, scrambling forward. He runs his tongue up the Monster's foul-tasting length, hating himself, trying so hard not to throw up. As he laps and sucks he can hear his brothers weeping, asking for him, wondering why he hasn't arrived to save them.

The Monster's tail reaches around him, the cold, hard tip nudging at his entrance. Leo stiffens, eyes wide, as the Monster gently strokes the top of his head in false comfort. "A ninja must give every part of himself to his master," it says.

Sobbing in horror and shame, Leo lifts his tail. The Monster shoves up inside him, vicious and unforgiving. Leo _screams_ , but the sounds are muffled as the rat shoves its cock into his mouth, smothering him.

He's shrieking, his voice melting into his brother's cries, and when his eyes snap open he's still screaming. Leo lies curled up on his tatami mat, a gag shoved in his mouth. He's been putting it there when he goes to sleep for a while, because he is the leader and leaders do _not_ wake their brothers by screaming in their sleep.

Leo sits up with a groan, pulling out the gag and tossing it aside. He forces himself into a crosslegged position, taking deep, slow breaths. He will meditate, he will regain control of himself, and everything will be alright.

It doesn't matter that his hands are quivering, that his shoulders are shaking, that tears are slowly trickling down his face. If what just happened is an issue, it shouldn't be. It was just a _dream_ , after all.

Donnie is hiding. He cowers under the table in his lab, listening as Bebop and Rocksteady tear it apart. They're smashing all his hard work, all his delicate inventions, all the protective systems he built to keep _things_ like them out. There's no robot here to protect him, no soft metal shell for him to crawl inside.

He knows that he should lunge, attack while he has the advantage, but he can't fucking _move_. His teeth are chattering and his limbs are vibrating and his back hurts so, so, so bad. It's like a spear pinning him, keeping him still.

Rocksteady sees him and drags him out until the light, snickering as Donnie kicks and screams. "You're bein' awfully rude, Donnycakes," he says, dangling Donnie upside down by his legs.

"Yeah," Bebop agrees. "We're your guests and you ain't even said hello. Someone's gotta teach you manners" He slaps Donnie on the ass; both monsters chuckle as he writhes in humiliation.

They sweep his equipment aside and slam him onto a table, pinning his arms above his head. "Please," he sobs, trying and failing to twist out of their grip. "Please don't break my shell, please, not again..."

"Your shell?" Bebop asks. "Baby, that's old news." He squeezes Donnie's thigh, digging his fingers painfully deep into soft green flesh. "We wanna keep you around for a lot longer this time."

"To start," says Rocksteady, hefting that awful hammer, "Juniper here's gonna put a few butterfly kisses on those freaky hands of yours."

" _No!"_ Not his hands, his hands are his connection to his craft, to the mechanics he loves. Without his hands, how will he build machines to protect his family? How will he help them survive in this twisted, terrible world? "No, please, not my hands, anything but my hands..."

"Sorry, Donnycakes," Bebop says, pressing a massive thumb up against Donnie's slit and making him screech. "We just thought you'd be a whole lot cuter without those annoying little handsies."

"An' after we're done with that," Rocksteady chimes in, "we're gonna string ya from the living room ceilin' and play with ya for a while, 'til your brothers come home. And then we'll play wid' all _four_ of ya."

"Please," Donnie begs, choking on snot and tears. "Don't hurt them, don't..." In desperation, he spreads his legs, tries to make himself more appealing, to distract them from the others. "I'll do anything for you, I'll be so good, just leave them alone..."

"Oh, you will be, Donnycakes," Bebop says, adjusting his grip on Donnie's hands. "You'll all be." He pats his chainsaw thoughtfully. "You think the crazy red one will fuck the little orange one if we threaten to shove Roberta up his ass?"

"I sorta doubt we'll have to go that far," Rocksteady says thoughtfully, raising his hammer high.

 _"Please!_ "Donnie wails, and the pain splits his soul to the core, the cracking of his bones is like snapping tree branches, the hammer comes down over and over as he tumbles to his bedroom floor, weeping.

He lies there, shaking, counting his hands over and over to remind himself that they're still there, they're still intact. _He's_ still intact, the monsters aren't there, the horrible beasts are _gone._

After a while, Donnie forces himself to his feet and goes to brew coffee, heads back to work since he might as well get something done while he's up.

While he works in his lab he finds himself jumping at sudden noises and occasionally glancing over his shoulder, which is ridiculous. Dreams are just random patterns produced by his brain during REM. They don't mean _anything_.

Mikey is trapped. He pounds his hands bloody on the unyielding glass, trying to scream through the mask, but his words are muffled and distorted. He tries to tug it off his face, but it grips painfully tight whenever he tries. He's afraid if he tugs too hard he'll yank his own skin off.

There's something sliding through the tubes, toward his throat, something bad-smelling and awful. It's going to hurt him the way Leo was hurt, the way Alopex was hurt, the way Slash was hurt, the way he feared Raph would be hurt while he was missing. It's going to burn all the Mikeyness out of him, turning him into a hollow, obedient shell.

And he can see _everyone_ standing outside the tank, looking in at him. There's Bishop with Slash looming over his shoulder: his sweet, clever friend reduced to a demon's puppet. There's Woody shaking his head with a look of disgust, and Mikey can hear him say, "Sorry, man. It's too much for him, you know?" There's Hob with the Mutanimals, all chuckling with each other at the sight of the little snake getting his comeuppance.

And his _brothers_ are there, too, identical and faceless in their Foot gear. Their father stands in front of them, still wearing his simple robe, but his eyes are cold and dead in a way that only the Shredder's could be.

Mikey screams their names, begs and pleads. " _Don't do this!"_ he wails, as the evil liquid crawls ever closer. _"Please don't do this! I'm sorry! Please!"_ But when he screams it just makes it easier for the poison to slip down his throat, burning him from the inside out.

He wakes up choking and dashes to the trash can, mixing in tears and snot with his vomit. For a while he just huddles there, retching and shaking, as the shudders subside.

And then, because he's Mikey, he goes out to seek comfort.

He passes by Donnie's lab, but his brainy brother is hard at work on some invention, as usual. Only it's not usual, because Donnie keeps twitching and jumping around for no reason, shooting wild glances over his shoulder.

Huh. Weird. Mikey makes his way to Leo's room, only to see him silently sobbing from the lotus position. "Mikey?" he asks, and then his eyes widen as he starts frantically scrubbing at his face.

Starting to develop a theory now, Mikey pokes his head into Raph's room. His brother is pacing wildly around the room, muttering to himself as he pumps free weights. "The fuck do you want, runt?" he growls, pitching a weight near Mikey's head. Or he tries to, but instead it slips from his trembling fingers and hits the floor with a _thump._

Okay, that's it. Mikey stomps in and grabs Raph by the arm while he's off-balance, dragging him out of the bedroom and down the hall. "What the _fuck?"_ he snarls, throwing a few clumsy punches that Mikey easily dodges

"Meeting in the living room, now!" Mikey barks, banging on Leo and Donnie's doors as he passes. He gently shoves Raph into the living room and sets about stripping the couch of pillows, tossing them onto the floor as he sets about making a nest.

"Mikey, what's going on? It's the middle of the day--"

He cuts Leo off. "Yeah, and don't even pretend you were still asleep. None of us were." He shoots them all a reassuring grin. "Nightmares, amiright?" Leo blushes, Raph groans, and Donnie glances over his shoulder when he thinks nobody's looking.

"So I thought..." Mikey gestures to his nest. "...Turtle pile!"

The others blink at him. "Pardon?" Donnie asks.

"I saw this TV show where the characters slept in this pile when they were all tired and scared," Mikey explains, throwing himself down with an _oomph._

Raph stares. "The hell kind of show was that?"

Mikey shrugs from his prone position. "Don't remember. Point is, if one of us has a nightmare, we can wake up and know right away that everyone else is right here, so we can protect them and they can protect us."

The others shuffle their feet, torn between maintaining their adolescent dignity and admitting to themselves that Mikey's words make a kind of comforting _sense,_ damn it.

Donnie caves first, flopping down on the pillows with a groan and snuggling up against Mikey. Leo and Raph glance at each other before deigning to lower themselves, awkwardly folding themselves over and besides their brothers.

"This is fucking uncomfortable," Raph mutters, but instead of getting up he just shifts around a little more.

After a little rocking and poking and trying very hard not to smother each other, they manage to form a fairly adequate turtle pile. In the dim light from the hallway, Mikey can see his brother's faces start to slowly relax as they start to hold each other more tightly.

"Night, guys," Mikey says, stretching out his limbs so he can maintain contact with all of their bodies at once. There is no glass keeping them apart; right now the very possibility feels ridiculous.

"Night, Mikey," they murmur, one by one.

"I love you," he tells them.

"I love you," they reply (even Raph), their voices stumbling over each other together before melting together.

They cling on to each other with death grips until they slowly drift off to sleep, and they have no more nightmares that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mikey to the rescue! Hope you caught the 2012 reference. If anyone's going to get meta it's the Mikester.


	15. Oxygen

Mikey's taking a shower when it happens. He tilts his head back, and then it splashes down his throat and he can't _breathe,_ he's suffocating, the squirrels are sucking him under the water, into the dark, and his internal organs are ripping themselves apart...

He crashes to the floor, ripping the shower curtain. Leo finds him huddled on the damp tile, gasping and panting, drowning on dry land.

"Breathe with me," he whispers, gathering Mikey in his arms. "Breathe." He takes big, exaggerated breaths and slowly Mikey forces himself to copy them. They lie curled up together for a while, just breathing, as the water dribbles in the background.

Eventually, Mikey pulls himself back from the edge and Leo plants a kiss on his head before helping him to his feet. "Thanks, bro," Mikey murmurs, wrapping himself in towel as Leo turns off the water. "Anytime," Leo replies.

A few days later, Raph's lying in bed (on his back, the way he was when they strapped him down) when he feels it: the worm wiggling up across his face, cold and hungry and disgusting. He grits his teeth and presses his face to the pillow, reminding himself that it isn't there.

But it _feels_ like it's there, and when it jabs inside him, _violates_ him, it hurts as much as it did the first time. He can feel it wiggling around inside his skull, turning over his most private thoughts and feelings, sucking him dry until he's reduced to an obedient little _thing._ He presses his hands in his mouth to smother the screams, but he can stop his breath from escalating into loud, desperate pants.

Leo hears the noise and pokes his head into the room. He goes to Raph's side and gently pulls him upright, rubbing his shell and murmuring comforting words. "Breathe," he says, demonstrating with deep, slow breaths. For the first time in his life, Raph follows his sibling's orders without questions, until he finally relaxes.

Afterwards he shoves Leo away, embarrassed, and turns away, bearing himself back under his blankets. "I love you, Raph," Leo says. "Love ya too, dipshit," Raph mutters.

Donnie's staring at a piece of equipment when its lights suddenly flickering, and then they're replaced by bright white eyes, the buzz of inhuman power across his vision. And then his skin is no longer his skin, and his bones are no longer his bones, and his body is drifting apart in a cloud of particles, swallowed by nothing. He tries to scream, to beg himself to come back together, but his lungs no longer exist and the air is ripping him apart instead of flowing through him.

He crashes to the floor, and suddenly Leo's there, looming over him the way _she_ did. Donnie scrambles backward with a whimper, but Leo drops down to his level, hands raised, voice soft and conciliating. "Breathe," he says, taking loud, heavy breaths. He's doing that thing they learned about when they looked up coping with trauma symptoms together, and to Donnie's surprise it actually works.

He lies pressed to Leo's chest, relishing how very solid and real and _intact_ they both are. "It's okay," Leo murmurs, and to his surprise Donnie realizes that there's enough evidence to back up his statement.

After a while, Leo helps him back into his chair and stays with him as he goes back to work, asking questions about the machine that Donnie is only too happy to answer. Before Leo leaves, he plants a soft kiss on Donnie's head, and Donnie leans into the touch, relaxing as he breathes in his brother's scent.

A little while later, they're running home for a mission when Leo's pace picks up. Mikey glances at the sky and sees grim grey clouds looming overhead, dropping soft flakes. They haven't reached the entrance to the lair before the snow starts to fall in earnest. Leo starts throwing glances over his shoulder, eyes widening at the sight of archers and metal men that only he can see.

They leap to street level, but while the others are gathered around a manhole cover Leo backs up towards the wall, glaring up at nothing. "Dude?" Raph asks, and Leo spins in his direction, hands on his swords. His chest shoots up and down as he lets out strangled gasps.

"Breathe," says Mikey, raising his hands high as he cautiously approaches his brother. The others glance at each other before following his lead. "Breathe," they all say, taking loud and exaggerated breaths.

Leo lurches forward with a panicked groan, but his brothers take his hands. They lead him underground, breathing for him until he remembers how to do it on his own.

When they reach the lair Leo pulls away from them, looking embarrassed, but Mikey yanks him into a hug and the other two quickly pile on. The last of the snow melts from Leo's brain and the bad memories drift away from the forefront of his brain, chased away by a soft, warm blanket of strong green arms.

"Thanks, guys," he murmurs.

"Anytime," Raph tells him.


	16. Prey

"Bring me a turtle," Mistress Kitsune said, and what Mistress Kitsune wants, she gets.

So Alopex makes her way through the city streets, white paws soft and swift on cold rock. Her nostrils flare as she searches for the familiar scent, of green and water and the underneath.

She's not worried about catching a turtle, although she is worried about the effort it'll take to drag it home. Alopex is deceptively strong, but turtles are deceptively heavy. Still, she knows she can handle it. Mistress Kitsune never gives her more than she can bear.

Her quarry is making his way along a rooftop, silent and swift, red bandanna glittering in the moonlight. The orange one would have been easier to drag, and she knows that Kitsune is particularly eager to break the blue one again, but a turtle is a turtle, so when Alopex sees him she decides that there's no reason not to sneak up on this one.

Besides, something...draws her to this particular turtle, in a way she can't fully understand. She wants to explore that.

His nose and ears aren't nearly as good as hers, but he still manages to pick up on her when she lands quietly on the rooftop behind. "Wha--" he spins, hands flying to the knives at his hips. "Alopex?"

She says nothing, just draws her kamas. She's not here to kill him, but something tells her he's the kind of turtle who might be worn down with a good fight. Their blades _screech_ off another, painfully loud, and Alopex's ears twitch. She ignores it, though. She's been listening to the harsh clang of blades since she learned to speak, and she's learned to cope with that as she's coped with so many other things.

"Alopex, _wait,"_ he begs, dancing away from her blows. "What are you doing?"

"Hunting prey," she replies, leaping neatly over his head and and _nearly_ landing a good blow on his skull. He's fast, she'll give him that.

She rolls to her feet, looking him up and down. "Such pretty little claws," she says, her voice low and mocking. "Are you a girl-turtle, then?"

He advances on her, eyes wide. "Alopex, please, you need to _listen_ to me--"

"Predators don't listen to prey," she clucks, embarrassed at him not knowing that.

The turtle huffs, a look of vague exasperation mixing in with his fear--something Alopex's never seen before. "I'm not _prey_ , Al, I'm your _friend_. Remember?"

"Friend?" she scoffs. "You are _turtle._ I am _fox._ I _ate_ little beasts like you, back when I ran on four legs."

"Right." He knocks one of her blades aside and sends her tumbling with a pretty solid punch, although she springs back into a fighting stance before he can follow up. "Tell me, is Kitsune speaking _through_ ya, or are ya just off your tree like Leo was?"

Alopex frowns, because now that she thinks about it Kitsune really _isn't_ inside her, and that's...weird. Of course, she's there the way Kitsune always is, with a soft buzz of whispers at the back of her head, but those whispers aren't actually telling her what to do or what to say, right now.

She's still thinking about this when the turtle launches a roundhouse at her head, and she drops her kamas to grab his foot and yank him off balance. He tumbles backward, shell clanking, and she snatches up her blades as she sprints at him.

They roll across the roof, weapons locked, hissing and spitting at each other. She's inhaling deep lungfuls of his scent now, feeling his muscles pressing up against hers, and something about the sensations energizes her. She lets out a growl, low yet playful, and snickers as he twists away from her snapping jaws.

"Enough!" he finally roars, straddling her, locking his knees and pinning her in place. "Your name is _Alopex._ You get your kicks by running around with a crazy girl in a purple supersuit. You're one of the few people who knows I do tai chi. The night we met I threw you off a building and you tried to cut my throat with shurikens, but since then we've managed to actually become good fri--"

 _No no no no_ scream the voices in her head, and Alopex _lunges_ , digging her teeth deep into his arm. His blood is richer than she expected, heavy and sweet as it pours down her throat.

"FUCK!" the turtle howls, toppling, and Alopex has a split second to realize that they were closer to the edge than she realized before they're both plummeting into the dark.

The turtle hits a closed dumpster shell first, Alopex on top of him, with a loud _whump_ and a grunt. They tumble to the ground together, weapons clattering everywhere, but Alopex leaps to her feet first and kicks the turtle in the head while he's trying to sit up.

He's still conscious, but she's gotten sick of this fight and she doesn't feel like hauling him back to base, so instead she grabs some rope from her belt and starts tying his hands together. He screams as she yanks on his bloody arm, and she ignores the way the sound makes her heart hurt.

"What, what the _fuck?"_ he gasps, staggering to his feet. "Are you trying to _kidnap_ me?" He tugs on the ropes with all his strength, but the elaborate knot she's tied only makes the rope clutch more tightly with each pull. She rips off a piece of her cloak and ties it around his wound; mustn't let him bleed out while he still has a chance of being useful.

"Come," she says, yanking on his uninjured arm.

"Eat shit." He tenses, preparing to backflip away, and Alopex hooks the kama that she miraculously managed to hold onto around his neck, locking him in place.

"It is not a request," she growls. "Mistress Kitsune wants you to join her forces. You should be honored to receive her attention."

"Okay, first, it _is_ you, unless Kitsune's gone crazy enough to talk 'bout herself in the third person. Second, the 'Resistance is Futile' routine is fuckin' ridiculous, and you're gonna be real embarrassed lookin' back on it later. Third, that Hello Kitty mind-flayer of yours can suck my dick."

Her paw cracks across his face, sending him staggering, and the kama's blade digs into his skin, sending blood dripping down his neck. An apology crawls up her throat, but the words that force themselves out are, "You will show _respect_ to Mistress Kitsune or be punished."

 _"Punished?"_ He barks a hysterical laugh. "Oh, God, getting your brain scrambled really brings out your inner dominatrix, didn't it? I guess we should both be grateful that crazy cunt didn't dress you in leat--"

 _"Enough."_ She wraps her free paw around his throat, cutting off his words with a gasp, and drags him forward a few steps before letting him go and watching him heave for air. "We're going _home_ , both of us. You are _prey_ , and you will do as you told. Now. Walk."

The turtle gives her a wild, twisted smile. "Oh, I _never_ do what I'm told, sweetheart," he chokes out.

Sweetheart. The name awakens something in her: a loud thud to the back of her skull, a taunting cry, a motorcycle's roar. Burning fury, mixed with a strange sort of respect, even admiration, for some kind of quip or trick. She tries to shake it away, hissing: "Stop talking. Start walking."

"No." The turtle straightens his back and looks her dead in the eye. "You can kill me if you want, but I'm not lettin' that bitch brainwash me."

He's telling the truth, and Alopex freezes, because she has a problem. She's supposed to bring this turtle home, _alive_ and relatively intact, only now he seems to think death is truly better than life as Mistress Kitsune's student. She doesn't understand it, and she doesn't understand why the idea of killing him makes her blood run cold.

So instead she looms over him, trying to regain control of the situation. "Why are you acting like this?" she asks. "You're afraid, I know you are. Why don't you just give in?"

The turtle tilts his head to gaze up at her, not seeming to notice how the kama scratches the back of his skull. "I'm not scared," he says simply. "I'd never be scared of ya, Alopex."

"Liar," she growls. She can smell his fear, hanging heavy in the air.

"I'm not scared of _you,"_ he clarifies. "I..." his feet shuffle in the dirt, and his confidence flickers for the first time. "I'm scared of turning out like you: a toy, a weapon, turned against the people I love. I'm scared that I won't be able to help you, to save you from this."

"There's nothing wrong with me," she replies, confused.

"There isn't?" He laughs again, but his eyes are sad. " _Look_ at yourself, Al. Is she even feeding you?"

She does, taking care not to move her kama. Maybe she's a bit thinner than she was in the past, her coat a tad less glossy, but what does it matter? She can maintain an optimal performance over long periods of limited food. "I'm hardy," she says.

"Yeah, you are," the turtle agrees. "You're the toughest person I've ever met." His eyes are glittering, bright with something she doesn't understand. "I...I don't know if you remember this, but this isn't the first time we've been enemies. Not to the first time you've been enslaved by monsters, neither."

His words are stirring up memories, bright and painful flashes. She winces, although he doesn't seem to notice: "You broke _away,_ Alopex. You didn't have anyone to help you, and you turned your back on that bitch and her asshole boyfriend, against your whole _world_ , rather than let them hurt you again. You can do it again; I know you can."

"Stop." New images are creeping into her mind, images of sharp needles and sharper swords, a forest on fire and an arrow piercing her flesh. _"Stop."_ She jams the kama back into her belt and shoves him, hard. He falls with a _thump,_ letting out a cry through gritted teeth

"You have to _stop,_ " she says, landing on top of him (feet resting lightly on his chest, hands on his shoulders, have they done this before?). "It _hurts."_ Half of her mind is screaming at her to _kill him now_ , the other half is ordering her to follow Kitsune's commands by bringing him home alive, and now the memories, the _thoughts,_ are slicing through everything like shrapnel.

"I know," he said quietly. "I'm sorry. Remembering hurts, it always does. But if you come home with me, we can work on it together, we can-- _gaah!"_

Her brain was splitting itself on the issue of whether or not to rip out his throat, so she decided to compromise by running her tongue across it. She swallows a few drops of blood and licks her lips. The taste feels good, makes her head pleasantly light.

"Did you just fucking--" He cuts himself off, eyes widening. "Oh," he breathes, and suddenly he's relaxing, leaning back into the concrete.

"Is this what you need?" he asks, his voice quiet in a way that something tells her is very, very unusual. "You--what happened to you, it's not like what happened to Leo. Talkin' doesn't work. But..."

She feels movement and looks down to see him spreading his legs. His smell has changed into something that makes her nose twitch, something strange, but not unpleasant. Alopex thinks her smell might be changing, too.

"I could do it," the turtle says, voice shaking a little. "I...I've never been vulnerable with someone, not like that. But I could do it for you, Al. _With_ you."

Alopex doesn't really understand what he's saying (and she doubts he does, either) but it's intriguing. She shifts until she's kneeling between his thighs, fur brushing against the bulge forming there. She runs her paws over his torso, feeling his breath quicken at her touch.

The whispers are buzzing at the back of her head, but it's not like Mistress Kitsune said she _couldn't_ do this, did she? She's just doing a little...investigation before she takes the turtle home. Maybe if she goes through with this he'll finally shut up.

She leans down to kiss the turtle and he tries to rise up to meet her, but she pushes him down. "No," she murmurs. She's not going to give him any room to take advantage of her, not now that she's seen what's he capable of.

Their lips meet as she reaches between her legs, running a curious paw over his tail. He lets out a soft groan and something hard emerges out of his nowhere, pushing eagerly into her hands. She squeezes his cock and smirks as he lets out a strangled cry.

" _Kuso,"_ he growls, eyes glassy. _Fuck._ "Go-od." His tail _thwaps_ against her leg and she shifts her attention to that, running it through her fingers. He lets out a low, deep churr, voice throbbing in her ear.

There's a funny dampness between Alopex's legs and she reaches down to finger herself. A warm feeling of pleasure boils up in her tummy, stronger and brighter than anything she's felt since...since Kitsune...but she's always been Kitsune's, hasn't she?

She growls, shaking the thought away, and moves her hands faster.

"Wait," the turtle growls, bandanna rustling as he shakes his head. "Don't...not too fast. I don't--don't wanna come too early." He lets out another churr, and the sound is so sweet that she presses her lips to his so she can swallow it up.

She slows the pace, suddenly wanting to savor every second of this because when she takes the turtle home he will belong to Kitsune, but now...now he is _hers._ And maybe she is _his_ , even though she's supposed to belong to Kitsune, even though she's not...supposed...to...want. Right? 

Finally, she can't stand the sensations building in her body or the confusion burning in her mind, so she gently guides him inside. " _Oh,"_ he whimpers, his voice breathy and desperate. And Alopex moans in return, because it hurts pulling him inside her, but it's a good hurt, a cleansing pain of the kind she didn't even know was possible. There's blood on the inside of her thighs, but it smells so sweet she doesn't care.

She leans down, one hand still touching herself while the other braces itself on his chest, planting gentle kisses all over his face and neck.

The turtle lifts his hips with a soft groan, moving inside her, and Alopex gasps at the sensation. It's an invasion, but a gentle one, not like

_cold fingers ripping through her skull whispers building into screams within her head but the sounds they're making and the things she's feeling drown it all out_

"Please," he whispers, as they push and grind at each other, bodies fusing together. "Let me touch you, _please..."_ And before the words _Mistress Kitsune wouldn't like it_ can form in her sex-fogged brain, her claws are reaching behind his back as it lifts off the ground, tearing open the ropes.

His hands run over her waist, her tail, caressing the small breasts hidden beneath her white fur. "Beautiful," the turtle groans. "So fucking beautiful." And when Alopex looks down at him she realizes that he's beautiful, too, even more beautiful than Mistress Kitsune.

The turtle's pace picks up and she sinks her claws into his shell, wrapping her legs around his waist. He's babbling, a confused mix of English and Japanese, and to her surprise Alopex realizes that she's babbling back. The voices climb higher and higher, daring someone to find them, to try and tear them apart.

When his voice breaks, something warm fills up Alopex's insides as he buries his teeth in her neck. He's vibrating inside her now, and the sensation is enough to push Alopex over the peak.

_"Raphael."_

The word spills out of her unbidden, striking the fragile walls inside her mind like a missile. She knows who he is, knows what they've done to and for each other. More importantly, she knows who _she_ is.

She collapses, buried under the tsunami of anger and and pain and grief and fear and pleasure and shame and guilt and hope and defiance and love and lust and and joy and confusion and determination and desperation that is the being called Alopex. She slides onto his chest, boneless, listening to his heartbeat because it's the only thing keeping her sane in the storm.

They lie there like that for a while, panting, sticking with their own and each other's fluids, minds spinning with what they've just done.

Raph speaks first. "Well, that was definitely not how I imagined my first time. Still, I had fun. How 'bout you?"

She lets out a small, sad chuckle.

Raph glances down at her, eyes full of concern. "You back with me, Al?"

"Yeah." She lurches awkwardly to her feet and goes to get her kamas, slinging them back over her hips. Then she starts to climb.

He sits up, voice going taut with panic. "Hey, where you goin'?"

"I can't stay," she says, glancing down at him. "She'll find me. She'll make me hurt you, you and the others." The inside of her head is an burned house, battered and empty, but it won't stay that way for long. Her _Mistress--_ that sadistic cunt--will come creeping back soon enough.

"She just tried to make you do that, remember?" Raph asks, tucking himself back in. "It didn't work."

Alopex shakes her head and keeps climbing. "She wasn't paying attention then. She will be next time. I have to get away. I have to go _home_."

Raph staggers upright and tries to climb after her, hissing as his injured arm spasms against the stone. "Alopex, _please,_ " he begs. "Come home with me, we can help you--"

"I'm sorry," she says, blinking back tears. She can't look back at him; if she does she'll never be able to do this. "I'm so sorry." Then she darts up the alley's sides and vanishes into the night.

She never expects to see him again.

But he follows her north, him and Angel. He scours the wilderness and the astral plane to find her. He stands at her side as she faces Kitsune down, rips that demon out of her head for good with a fury borne of ice and blood.

Afterward, they share a soft kiss in the snowy wood, hands locked together. They promise each other to make something sane, something _real_ , something more than desperate battles and wild fucking in a filthy alleyway.

Alopex holds her turtle tight, breathing in the scent of something that is both prey and predator, just like her.

Her mind is still a battered house, but at least she won't be alone when she rebuilds it.


	17. Quiet

When Splinter's new children don't respond to his commands, at first he's worried that they will never able to process human speech. Then he notices how their faces brighten when he's speaking to them--but only when they're looking at him, or if he's standing directly behind them. They can hear--or, perhaps, feel--a sword blade clattering on the floor, but they don't react when he clangs sword blades together at the far end of the room.

Splinter adapts, which has always been a special talent of his. He steals every book on ASL and raising deaf children that he can, sneaking into libraries so he can answer specific questions on their computers. Within a few years, his children have learned to communicate without words, hands blurring and faces twitching at lightning speed.

It's hard, teaching them how to be silent ninja when the world is already so quiet to them. Still, Splinter does his best. They have an innate talent for picking out vibrations and he encourages them to hone it, to pay razor-sharp attention to the movements of the air or the heat of warm bodies.

He spends more time guiding them into working as a unit than he would if they could hear. They need to be constantly aware of each other if they are to survive, to know their brothers' movements as intimately as their own, to communicate through eyes as much as they do through hands.

They squabble and make up the way all children do, they follow their own paths and interests as they creep into adolescence. Mikey hones his nose and tongue into flawless tools as he learns to cook, Leo falls in love with _Space Heroes_ and its heroic subtitles, Donnie investigates the mechanical world with bright eyes and clever fingers, and Raph pumps heavy rock, placing his hands over the speakers so he can feel the songs vibrate through his bones.

Splinter doesn't want to let them go to the surface on their fifteenth birthday, but they've worked so hard, developed skills far greater than anything he imagined possible from deaf children. They've survived solo trips into the sewers, days alone while he goes to gather supplies. He believes, has to believe, that they are ready for this final step.

When they meet April O'Neil, she's terrified, and the fact that none of these creatures seem capable of speech doesn't help, despite Donnie dropping his bo to frantically sign. But then her mind brushes against up against theirs, and she realizes that they are _people_ , people with hopes and dreams and fears, people who are desperate to help her. And then she's still afraid, but not of them. Never of them, not ever again.

As they adventure together, she pushes her telepathic abilities, learning to speak with them mind-to-mind. They have an easier time communicating in images and feelings than words, thoughts sometimes blurring too fast for her to keep up.

Communicating with the other new people who enter their lives is less simple. For a while, they have to communicate with Leatherhead with images and simple words, laboriously drawn out on poster papers. Slash is even harder, and nearly ends in disaster before he learns to respond to Raph's pleading looks and gentle touches. April and Splinter often serve as intermediary in their communications with Casey Jones, although exaggerated facial expressions and exchanged middle fingers can work in a pinch.

Leo and Karai end up leaving messages written on origami for each other; they start with taunts and double entendres, which slowly escalate into something more. When Leo hands her a message saying "Hamato Yoshi is your father," she rips it up savagely, and does the same for his next few missives.

Eventually, she believes. And then she's transformed, plunging her into Leo's silent world. She slithers away, half-mad with shock and horror, leaving the turtles to pick up the pieces. And then their world crashes down around them.

When he first wakes up from his coma, Leo is horrified at the way his hands shake, his nerves still healing from Saki's cruelty. He's terrified of leaving the rest of his life helpless, silent, unable to communicate with the people he loves except through April. But he's able to grit his teeth and push through recovery, until he's able to sign with grace and skill once more.

They return to New York, to face new changes and dangers. Leo tracks Karai down, doing his best to communicate with her despite her limited knowledge of ASL (or hands to sign with) and fury at April's mental probes. She flickers between forms, snapping between noise and silence, and it's hard for anyone, even Karai herself, to decide what she prefers.

After Raph is brainwashed, he doesn't respond to his brothers' pleading eyes or the desperate shouts of their vocal friends. Then Leo casts aside his swords and starts signing, heedless of the sai hovering in front of his face. _Remember_ , he begs, over and over again. _I'm your brother. I love you. Remember._ And Raph remembers, remembers fury and passion and fierce love for Fearless, and turns on Saki, letting out a guttural scream.

Bringing Karai back from the dark is harder, a slow and painful process. Wrenching the brain worm out of her head has costs; her mind is now permanently split between human's chatter and snake's silence. She can feel approaching steps from thirty feet away, but she will never speak with human words again.

She flees to Japan, seeking a witch friend who might be able to fix her. Shinigami can't do that, but she helps Karai adjust, gives her the tools to learn JSL and later ASL.

Meanwhile, the turtles are plunged into space, on a journey like nothing they have ever experienced. Up among the stars, things are as actually silent as they feel down on Earth. They adjust to that well enough, although it's harder coping with the danger and grief. Their form with Casey and April grows ever fiercer up among the stars; they are often the only things keeping each other sane.

The earth is saved. Karai returns to the family, exchanging precise, cautious signs with all of them, especially Leo. Shredder's power and fury grows in the distance, a storm they can all feel about to break.

April's crystal helps her understand the turtles better than ever before, until it makes her a danger to them. Then all four of their heads are filled with the cruel, burning scream of Za-Naron, a _noise_ like nothing they've ever encountered and never want to hear again.

Donnie hovers high above the city, frantically signing at April, but she doesn't look at him as she disintegrates him into nothing. So when the others pin her down, they don't bother with signing. Instead, they open her minds, pouring a stream of memories directly into April's head, all narrated by Casey's frantic shouts. Eventually she sinks back to earth, silence drowning out Za-Naron's howls.

In the seconds before he comes back, April silently asks Donnie if he wants to reborn with the power to hear. She could do it; in the comedown from Za-Naron she still has enough power to gift him functional ear slits. He says no; he won't be cut off from his brothers that way.

April is saved. Donnie is saved. Karai is saved, if at a high cost following her last battle with the Shredder. But Master Splinter cannot be saved, not again. The turtles let out strangled howls as they gather around his body, their tears staining his lush dark fur. For days afterward, none of them are coherent enough to sign.

Then they come crashing down on Saki's head in a quiet black tsunami. They scream their rage and pain; they can't hear it, but they can see from the fear in his eyes that the Shredder can. When Leo emerges with his head in one hand, he doesn't need to say anything for the others to know that it's over.

Afterwards, humans and turtles gather on a rooftop and watch the sun rise. Karai and Leo hold each other's uninjured hands, while Raph clings on to Slash's strong, spiky paw. They all look out at a world with no Splinter, but also no Shredder, a world they can shape to their own designs.

Leo stamps his foot, sending vibrations through the feet, and they all turn to look at him. _I love you,_ he signs.

One by one, they all sign it back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please feel free to use the idea of Deaf Turtles in your own work, if so inspired.


	18. Retribution

She couldn't bring him back.

April tried, but every time she reached for Donnie's atoms she could feel them drifting farther away, melting deeper into the city's fabric. She _pushed_ until sweat soaked her uniform and blood trickled from her nose and ears, but all her efforts produced was a pathetic little shimmer.

Then the last of him melted into nothing, and she knew in the depths of her soul that Donatello Hamato was gone from this world.

April fell to her knees with a defeated cry, the stone shuddering beneath her. The horror and guilt was sucking her down, into a hungry black pit she already knew was endless.

"Wait, what's going on? Where is he?" Raph yelled, his voice teetering on the edge of a shriek.

"I'm sorry," she said, tears dripping down her face. "I'm so sorry..."

"No...no. NO! YOU FUCKING BITCH!" Raph charged her and Casey knocked him aside at the last minute, both boys tumbling to hard concrete. Casey was screaming at Raph to calm down, and Raph answered with grunts and roars, his voice stripped of everything human.

"Donnie," Mikey whispered, falling to the ground. "D-d-Dooooonnie...." He broke into deep, shuddering sobs, vibrating like his shell was about to blow apart.

Leo, though...Leo was just looking at her, his face as cold and dead as stone. Their eyes locked, and an understanding passed between them.

"Okay," April said, straightening back up. She put her hands on her knees as she shifted into perfect seiza, lifting her chin.

Her hand twitched and her tanto flew back into her grasp. She ran her fingers over the hilt, so recently acquired and already so well-loved.

Leo walked behind her and came to a stop, reaching to draw one of his own swords from his sheath.

"What the fuck?" Casey jolted to a halt at the sight, barely seeming to notice when Raph slammed him into the ground. "Leo, what the fuck are you _doing?"_

"What he has to," April replied, adjusting her grip on the tanto. She pressed the blade lightly against the side of her shirt, wondering what would be a good angle for entrance.

"Wait, _what?!"_ Casey tried to scramble to his feet, but Raph pinned him with an armlock. " _Stop!_ That--this isn't what Donnie would have wanted."

"Donnie's gone," Leo reminded him, his words almost drowned out by the rain.

"It's okay, Case," April said, knowing she wouldn't be believed. "This is what has to happen."

"No no no, this is _insane._ We don't...we don't _execute_ people, guys. Guys?" Casey shot desperate looks at Raph, who was gazing down at him with an empty expression even as tears silently trickled down his green face, and Mikey, who was still weeping in a heap.

April glanced up at Leo, blinking a little as his blade flashed in her eyes. "You'll...you'll make something up for my dad, yeah? Tell him that I got disintegrated fighting the Kraang, or something. He doesn't have to know."

He nodded, eyes glittering even as his face was still. "Of course."

"This isn't going to bring Donnie back!" Casey howled. "It's not going to make you feel any better!"

"They don't have a _choice_ , Casey," April said, begging him to understand. "And neither do I. It doesn't matter that I didn't mean to do it, I _did_ it, and now we have to do _something_ about it, take our hurt out on _someone."_

He gaped at her. "That makes no fucking _sense."_

Of course it didn't. Sense and logic had died with Donnie. This was about her and the Hamatos coping with the agony ripping them apart from the inside out, about her getting a selfish escape from the pain and them finding a target for their rage.

And this was about Leo making sure that Donnie would be her only victim.

"I know," she said sadly. "This...this is the best option, for everyone. The one where we balance the scales and--and keep me from ever doing something like this again."

Leo lifted the sword high, blade flashing in the dim light.

"Get the fuck away from her or I swear--"

"Don't," she pleaded. "Don't fight them, this is going to be hard enough on them as it is. You don't have to ever see them again if you don't want to, but please don't fight them." She lifted her arms away from her body, pointing the tanto at her belly. "Leo...he's not going to do anything, really. He's just going to--to speed up the process."

Casey let out a wail and collapsed to the street, defeated.

"Sorry," April whispered. And then, louder, to all of them: "I'm sorry." Sorry for fucking up, sorry for hurting Donnie and by extension all of them, sorry for every mistake she'd ever made as a friend and a sister and clanswoman, sorry for leaving them to deal with this on their own.

She bowed her head, studying the face reflected in her tanto. It looked very old and very tired.

"We will honor your memory," Leo promised, his voice shaking slightly.

"I know." April wondered if Donnie would be waiting for her on the other side, if he'd forgive her. "Bye, Leo."

"Bye, April."

She shoved the tanto into her stomach, screaming in pain even as she slowly, steadily dragged it across her torso. Her guts flashed red when they started to spill onto the street, and then Leo's sword bit into the back of her neck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ....I really hope this doesn't come off as me advocating suicide.
> 
> Works inspired by this one: Когда мои друзья со мной... by Anny_Shredder at https://archiveofourown.org/works/28799709


	19. Spoils

To the victor goes the spoils.

Oroku Saki has won. The rat is dead, along with all of the turtle's allies. New York City is his in all, but name. And the turtles--beaten, broken, shackled to his bedchamber wall--are his trophies.

At first, they're defiant, glaring through puffy eyes and spitting insults through bruised mouths. Then he unhooks the youngest one to drag him, kicking and screaming, towards the bed. And oh, how quickly the bravado melts away as they beg _please don't, not him, take one of us, please._

He does take them, one by one. They can close their eyes, but they can't block out their brothers' agonized screams and unwilling churrs, anywhere more than they can ignore Saki's brutal taunts and triumphant moans. He wrenches blood, tears, and cum from each of them, forming an ugly mass to smear on their faces.

"Look at me, all of you," he says when he fucks one of them. "Look at me or I'll cut someone's eyelids off." And they do, every time, letting him see how pretty they look when they cry.

Saki is careful never to take his own eyes off them. The turtles are offered no privacy when they're permitted to relieve themselves, and he has cameras and microphones fixed on their prone bodies the rest of the time. Sometimes, he sits in his office and listens to them whisper to each other, offering false comfort and desperate plans of revenge. The sounds make him smile.

He writes lessons of obedience and discipline into their skin with whips and fists, blades and nooses, cold water and hot irons and electricity. He teaches them lessons about pleasure that are as vicious as the ones about pain, reminds them to be thankful that _someone_ has an interest in their hideous, inhuman bodies.

His name is carved into their flesh, deep and dark, along with the Foot Clan insignia. It's only good sense for a man to mark his property.

They won't eat, until he threatens to break the youngest one's legs, and then they obediently nibble treats from his hand. Saki strokes their masks, the one part of their old lives they've been allowed to keep, and tells them what good obedient boys they are. They gaze back with empty expressions, blinking away tears when they think he can't see.

Sometimes he lets them fight, enjoying how they struggle. The activity also serves as a form of exercise, allowing them to maintain those tantalizing muscles. On occasion one turtle or another almost escapes, but they never manage to reach the door, and then he has an excuse to give them a particularly vicious punishment.

It's funny, how they compete for his attention, trying so hard to keep his eyes off their brothers. At first, they attempted to rile him with vicious taunts, but he never takes out his fury on the one who insulted him, and they quickly learn better.

They all have different ways of trying to distract him. Leonardo slips into blankly unresponsive meditative states that Saki has to painstakingly pry him out of, which often requires the full range of his skills and fortitude. Raphael wiggles nonstop, trying to wear Saki down, his squirms endlessly tantalizing. Donatello uses his knowledge of the human body to try to increase Saki's pleasure, and actually manages to teach him a few new things. Michelangelo attempts to sway him with wanton obedience that can turn to aggression in an instant, providing a charming little struggle.

Usually he lets them try to play with him, finding amusement in how they dance on his strings like pretty green puppets. But if they haven't tried to escape or done anything else to draw his ire for a while, he hurts them for their manipulations, just to liven things up a little.

He offers them deals. If you do this to yourself, I'll get his wounds cleaned. If you suck me off, I'll have his leg set. If the two of you do these things to each other or to me, the other two will be left alone for the night. If you three put on a good show, he'll be given time to recover. The Shredder is a man of his word, when he wants to be, and they quickly learn to dance to his tune.

Saki _loves_ seeing his pets perform for him. The shine of sweat on green muscles, the clanking of chains, the muffled whispers of _I'm sorry, close your eyes, it's okay, it doesn't hurt, I love you, go here so it hurts less, I forgive you._ A beautiful orchestra, and he's the conductor.

The Shredder is generous with his possessions. If they've been particularly bad, he lets a group of his soldiers play with one or two of them while the others watch. On occasion he'll offer one to a potential business partner, a taste of the exotic bounties that come from obeying the Foot.

If Karai's managed to impress him recently, he lets her have Leonardo for a night or two. He'll stand outside his daughter's room and hear Leonardo promise to stay by her side, to fight and kill for her, if she will only kill her father and let his brothers go. Saki knows that he means it, and he knows that Karai knows, and he knows that she'll always say no. She learned a long time ago that there is no fighting Oroku Saki.

"You're mine," he whispers into their ear slits. "You're my trained sluts, my pretty little whores, my freaky cum rags. Deep down, you love my cock, don't you? If Master Vermin could see you now..." They just stare at him, unable to snarl back without putting their brothers at risk. He chuckles, thanks them for agreeing. Sometimes he'll go even farther, dragging out a "Yes, Master," or, if he's slightly drunk and feeling particularly cruel, a "Yes, Daddy."

As time passes, he starts pushing the turtles' limits, employing new tools and techniques. It's not about breaking them--they'll already do and say anything in order to give their brothers a moment of peace. Rather, it's seeing how far he can bend them before they shatter completely.

He watches them crumble in his iron-hard grip. They spend less time talking, silenced by shame and hopelessness. Sometimes they're reduced to animalistic clicks and grunts, babbling at nothing with the empty expression of the half-mad. They still throw their all into entertaining him, but when they think he can't see they go limp and tired, like dolls sagging in their boxes, fingers twitching uselessly. It's a very pretty sight.

Five months after he first claimed them, he's got Michelangelo twitching underneath him, those pretty eyes staring dimly into his. Then the turtle lunges upwards and Saki feels a low thrill of excitement. A _challenge_ , when they've grown so obedient he almost misses the first days of rebellion. He relishes the feel of Michelangelo's throat pulsing beneath his fingers, already plotting what he'll bring down on them all as punishment for this insubordination.

And then someone jabs two fingers into his neck.

Saki freezes, muscles locking up as he topples to the side. He's pulled out of Michelangelo with an unceremonious _squelch_ and lies on his side, paralyzed, dick fluttering miserably, eyes twitching wildly in his head. He sees Leonardo helping Michelangelo to his feet before they turn to gingerly extricate the others from their chains.

 _What?_ He'd searched them for lock picks, both makeshift or stolen from one of their other 'customers.' He'd done a very thorough job searching them, even enjoyed it. So how...?

Leonardo tosses something onto the stained blanket besides his head. Saki finds himself staring at a small, bloody green object that shines in the dimmed lights. _Oh._

Their _scales._ The edges of their scales are worn rough with every beating or cut, every drag of the chain against their skin. They'd slowly collected the scales that had fallen off, maybe even ripped it from their bodies. Then they'd started grinding them into a pick, disguised by fruitlessly wriggling, sticking it in the links of their chains or passing it from turtle to turtle during their "performances" so he'd never catch them holding it.

 _Passing_ , yes. Those clicks and grunts had been another form of speech, a way to coordinate who held the little lump of scales as it progressed into the tool, who would offer themselves up to him, let themselves be pushed to exhaustion or crippled by injuries while the one holding the pick kept working away.

The dedication it must have taken, the sheer perseverance...the struggles they must have had in communicating with a barely used language not exactly suited to espionage, the number of times the pick had had been lost in the carpet or caught in a chain, forcing them to start all over again...the endlessly honing of skills and working their fingers to the bone while watching their loved ones suffer, the presence of mind it must have taken to discreetly exchange their treasure as they were forced to rape each other....

If Oroku Saki wasn't more scared than he had ever been in his life, he might actually be impressed.

They shackle him to the bed and pick through his toy box, fishing out a muzzle to strap over his face. Then they turn over his collection of knives, murmuring to each other. He can hear them making plans for the future, discussing where they would go after they escaped (for of course they would escape, who watched the windows to the master's room?) and whether they would spare Karai's life (Leonardo said no, and his brothers accepted that without comment).

It is as if he is already dead. In their eyes, perhaps, he is.

They gather around him, blades gleaming in their hands. Those dull eyes are no longer as entertaining when they're looking down at him instead.

He's stretched out before them, naked and sticky and helpless. They look at his body not with fear or confusion, as they have in the past, but with expression of undisguised contempt. Goosebumps prickle on his bare skin, and it dawns on him how much more his body is _exposed_ when he's fully naked, so much more than theirs.

Raphael heats up a fire for some irons, while Donatello rips the blanket into strips of bandage. "If we're careful, we can keep you alive for a very long while," he explains. "We've got a window of five to six hours before we need to escape, which I'm sure will be adequate time for everyone to work out their feelings."

Leonardo brush a blade across Saki's temple, a parody of a caress. "I'd like to hear you scream, but we don't you whining for the guards, now, do we?" The knife presses into the delicate skin of Saki's outer ear, peeling it like an onion. "You'll have to beg with your eyes instead." Blood trickles down Saki's neck. "Do you think you can handle that, _Master?"_

The paralysis is wearing away, but they've piled on chain after chain, and struggle as he might Saki can't get free.

Michelangelo looms over him, kneeling between his spread legs. "Deja vu, dude," he murmurs, yanking painfully on Saki's dick. "Or, the other way around, I guess."

"I believe it's called _irony,"_ Donatello muses.

Saki closes to his eyes, listening to them banter. This is their final performance, he realizes, the greatest yet, and the only one he doesn't want to witness.

"Look at us," Raphael growls, fingers digging into his chin. "Look at us or we'll cut your eyelids off, _Daddy."_

"Fair warning, we might cut them off anyway," Michelangelo says, rubbing Saki's penis, the now-expert touch sending waves of pleasure through his body. At first he's confused, until it dawns him--they're going to wait until he's about to come before they slice it off. The thought makes him go limp, but Michelangelo just takes him in that painstakingly trained mouth, grinning merrily.

Over the next few hours destroy him carefully, painstakingly, enacting fantasies that have boiled in their heads for months. Sometimes they turn his own techniques and words against him, but they push farther than he ever has. They're not planning to keep him around to play with later, after all.

Every once in a while one of them will disappear, to snack on his food and sip his wine or water. Sometimes they'll rinse off the blood in the bathroom before going back to cover themselves in a fresh coat.

He tells himself not to cry or beg, to no avail.

In the end, he's just a quivering head and torso, stripped of his limbs and nose and sex. But they let him keep his eyes and ears. They don't touch his mouth, letting him whine pleas and apologies through the gag. "See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil," Donatello murmurs, tapping his face.

"Smell no evil, either," Michelangelo says, whiffing at the piss and fecal matter that have mixed with the blood staining the bed.

He is cut open with a surgeon's skill and a butcher's greed. They hold up his organs for him to inspect, one by one, let him drown in the tidal waves of blood rising in his body cavity.

Even now, when death is a mercy, he's still afraid to let go of life. He understands now why the turtles never tried to kill themselves no matter what he did to them.

The last thing Oroku Saki sees in this world is a turtle, which he is no longer sane enough to tell from the others, hold up a pumping red thing. "Look at that," he says. "The Tin Man had a heart after all."

To the victors go the spoils.


	20. Terror

The turtles were four years old when the Towers fell.

Splinter had heard snatches of running feet and yelling through the sewer grates, but assumed it was regular New York chaos. They were in the middle of a kata when something massive hit the ground above their heads with a bone-shaking _rumble_ , sending dust spiraling down from the ceiling and killing the fragile lights system. Sensei lost his balance and nearly fell over, a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence his students were not able to enjoy due to being distracted by the more pressing concern of shrieking at the top of their small lungs.

Mikey burst into tears, and Donnie followed suit, while Leo crawled beneath the hem of Splinter's robe to clutch desperately at his leg. "EARTHQUAKE!" Raph screamed. "We're all gonna die!" He sounded vaguely delighted by the prospect, in the way of small children who haven't totally grasped the finality of "dying."

Splinter gathered up the little turtles and rocked them against his furry chest. "No one is going to die," he told them, his voice reassuringly firm. "And that was not an earthquake--New York doesn't have earthquakes. That was probably just some particularly serious construction work."

He didn't tell them that he'd hadn't heard anything like that, ever, over the course of his residence in New York or Japan. And he made sure to take deep, slow, meditative breaths so they wouldn't pick up on his racing heart.

Once they had calmed down, he let them cling to his robe and each other as he made his awkward way to the light system. It took some poking around with flashlights and tweezers, and the biting back several choice words before they could reach his children's innocent ear slits, but he eventually figured out how to restore power and corral them back into practice.

Then it happened again. Same incredible rumble, same blackout, same group meltdown only now the boys were coherent enough to accuse each other of being babies. After putting both them and the electricity to rights, Splinter decided that practice was cancelled today and let them all cluster around the pinball machine, jumping up on a stool so they could poke at it with their tiny fingers.

He set about wrestling with the TV, just in case there was something he needed to know about. Just in case something had happened that was big enough to actually affect his new life in the sewers.

(He didn't _really_ fear that someone was dropping bombs on New York, at least he didn't think he did, but. Well. He had been living in a hole in the ground for four years, after all The world could have easily fallen apart without him noticing).

The TV didn't say anything about bombs when he finally got it on, but what it did show was just as if not more frightening for being so bizarre. The screen was covered in confused footage of smoking rubble and men in uniform racing around, intercut with newscasters babbling about...planes?

When he read the name of the buildings that had fallen, his breath caught. Even Hamato Yoshi, a tourist-turned-illegal-immigrant who'd only been in town a brief while before his mutation, knew the legend of the Twin Towers. He'd read about them in guidebooks, glimpsed them as he walked down the street. They'd...they'd just looked too _big_ to fall. It seemed impossible.

 _Almost as impossible as a giant rat raising four turtles_ , he thought glumly.

When they started talking about it being done on purpose, Oroku Saki's face was the first thing to flicker into Splinter's mind. Twisted with hate, eyes mad with pain and desperation, unconcerned to the point of oblivion about the damage inflicted on himself or others.

Yes, he knew that some men were capable of such terrible things. And now, the whole world knew as well.

"Sensei?" He looked down to see Leonardo tugging on his robe, big blue eyes wide with concern. "Are you okay?" Splinter realized that his mouth was hanging open and quickly closed it, resuming a more dignified air. His children could not remember him like this, so afraid and off-balance, no matter what happened in the world above.

"Everything's fine," he said, willing it to be true. "Come, let's make lunch." As he led Leonardo off to the kitchen, he shot a final glance over his shoulder at the TV, watching a smoky image of Ground Zero flicker across the screen. It reminded him so much of his old home that he felt nauseous, and he wondered how many Tang Shens and Miwas had been lost in the wreckage today.

After lunch, Splinter resumed katas, although he refused to turn off the TV. He was tense and distracted, ears swiveling as he tried to pick up more information. He snapped at the children more often than he would have liked, torn between maintaining a normal routine and trying to not miss anything important.

At dinner, he knew there was no getting around it any longer. As the turtles munched their food, he told them that the noises they heard earlier were the sound of two very big buildings falling down.

"Buildings?" Mikey narrowed his small brow. The children still had a hazy understanding of buildings, collected mostly from TV and Sensei's stories. They came across as upside-down version of the Lair, inhabited by people who were supposedly "normal" because they didn't have shells or fur.

"Buildings aren't supposed to fall," Donnie pointed out. That was the whole _point_ of buildings, wasn't it? Humans insisted on living in them, rather than securely tucking themselves underground, because buildings were meant to stay upright. Why stay in buildings if even the biggest ones could fall?

"This was an unusual case, Donatello," Splinter explained, rubbing his eyes. "Some...some very angry, very confused people decide to fly some planes into these buildings in order to knock them down--while--while they had people in them." They gaped at him in stupefied confusion.

Raph spoke first, as was his wont. "That's stupid," he scoffed.

Splinter sighed. "You might have a point, Raphael. It certainly is...illogical."

"Then why did they do it?" Donnie wanted to know.

His father shrugged. "They were unhappy, I suppose, and wanted to take their unhappiness out on someone, anyone. Knocking down those buildings gave them a chance to hold the world's attention, if only for a brief moment. Some people are far too hungry for attention, more than they should be."

"But not us," Leo said proudly. "We're ninja. We're _sneaky."_

Splinter gave him a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "Yes we are, my son. And more importantly, we are _safe_ down here. The angry people can't hurt us, because we are far from their attention and we know how to protect ourselves."

Unless attacks like this one became a regular occurrence, of course. If New York turned into a place that people ran _from_ rather than _towards_...well, joining an official evacuation wasn't option. The sewers that had been their refuge might end up becoming their prison.

Splinter tried very hard not to think about that.

"Did the Muslims do it?" Mikey asked suddenly. Everyone looked at him and he shrugged, blushing. "I...I heard on the TV, a buncha people talking about the Muslims. Are the Muslims the bad guys?" The other children blinked at him, wondering the Muslims were some kind of alien species that harried humankind.

But Splinter shook his head. "A Muslim is just a certain type of human, and Muslims as a whole are not responsible for the actions of a few of their members."

Mikey frowned. "Then why is everybody so mad at them?"

Splinter made an effort to meet his son's eyes. "Because sometimes humans are frightened by things that are different from them, things they don't understand, and they want to attack the thing that frightens them. The men in the planes didn't understand the people in the buildings, so they were scared of them and wanted to attack them. Those people on TV don't understand the things that make Muslims different, so they're scared of them."

There was silence as they all processed that. Donnie put the pieces together first: "Is...is that why you don't want us anywhere near regular people? 'Cause they might not understand us and they might attack us if they're scared?"

Splinter nodded a reluctant assent. "That is...part of the reason, yes, Donatello."

"Well, maybe if the humans got to know us they wouldn't be scared of us anymore!" Mikey chirped up.

"That's not how it works, dumbhead."

 _"Raphael,"_ Splinter growled.

"Sorry, Sensei," his son muttered. And then, speaking directly to his plate, "Sorry, Mikey."

Splinter straightened his back with a sigh. "Regardless of his improper delivery, Michelangelo, your brother has a point. For every human who will be willing to take a chance on you despite your appearance, there will be another who will do no such thing. Staying in the shadows is not only the true mark of a ninja, it is the best way for you to protect yourselves."

Mikey bowed his head, looking sad. "Hai, Sensei." They finished the meal in awkward quiet.

After dinner, he had them gather around as he made offerings to the spirits of the people who had been lost that day. Mikey sniffled a little, and even Raph was silent.

While his children slept, Splinter lay awake, trying his best to keep a calm and open mind about the future. _It will be all right,_ he promised himself. _There will be no wars. If there are wars, they will not reach us. If they will reach us, they will be over quickly. One way or another, we will endure._

Splinter's fears were not realized, and his family and New York enjoyed peace for over a decade. When war finally entered his sons' lives, they were as ready to face it as they ever could be.

Which, as anyone who's ever experienced war can tell you, was not nearly ready enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you find this story preachy or overly liberal, deal with it. We'll return to our regularly scheduled program of sex, gore, and general insanity next story: same Turtle time, same Turtle channel.


	21. Unreal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sort of an even more fucked-up sequel to "Confrontation."

Leo is sitting at the dining table in the Lair, sipping tea. Only he's not at the dining table, and this isn't the Lair, and if he's drinking anything at all it's not tea.

"This isn't real," he says. He makes a grab for his swords, but they're gone, and his shell is uncomfortably bare.

"Give the little turtle a great big hand," the Rat King replies, tossing his cup back like a shot. His eyes flicker like malfunctioning stop lights, reflecting a dancing flame that isn't in the room. "I didn't mean to indulge, but your head is full of _such_ attractive holes and you leave so many unguarded when you sleep."

"What are you doing here?" Leo asks, setting down his cup and pouring an incredible amount of effort into keeping his voice from shaking.

"Entertainment, mostly," says the Rat King, swirling the dregs of his tea with one crooked finger. "Usually I just crawl around in the brains of serial killers or the chronically depressed when I get bored, but then I remembered-- _mutants._ A whole new species, a whole new playground inside those odd little heads of yours."

He smiles, a movie star's grin that is terrifying in its perfection. "Not to mention the sheer joy that comes from playing with a little sister's toys--or breaking them."

"I'm not your toy, or Kitsune's," Leo growls, forcing himself to his feet. He stalks over to the door (a door that he doesn't remember being there, but there is no other way out of this kitchen) and yanks, to no avail.

"Don't be silly," the Rat King chides. "You're a mortal. That makes you a toy, because there will always be someone bigger who can play with you. You've just been taken out of the box more often than most of your kind."

"I don't want to _play_ ," Leo snarls, planting a vicious kick on the door. The pain shoots up his leg and he hits it again, trying to let it ground him. "I want to wake up _."_

"And I want jaguars to turn pink, Mount Everest to erupt, and North Korea to stop dicking around and fire the bloody missiles already," the Rat King replies. "We can't always get what we want." He studies his fractured nails thoughtfully. "Besides, how do you know you're not imagining me?"

Leo barks a laugh. "Don't be ridiculous." He throws his weight into his next punch, almost falling over, and the frame doesn't even rattle. "If I was imagining you, I could make you _go_ _away."_ He puts all the force he can muster into the last two words, hoping against hope that it might actually work.

But the Rat King just sighs. "Oh, poor Leonardo. Madness isn't just a switch you can flip on and off. If you're imagining me, why, then, I might just stay in this battered little psyche _forever."_

There's no way this door will give, but Leo keeps hitting it anyway--anything for an excuse to not turn around, to not let the Rat King see the fear in his eyes. "I'm. Not. Crazy," he grits out, each word punctuated with a blow. _Focus. Breathe. You beat Kitsune, you can beat this._

"Oh, you can't that help that," says the Rat King: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."

Leo jerks to a halt, shocked. "Are...are you quoting _Alice in Wonderland?"_

"Why not? It fits you, doesn't it? A strong propensity for wearing blue and throwing yourself in holes, starting out rather small and growing rapidly larger, wasting quite a bit of time following a strange furry creature around, a questionable grip on reality, not to mention that 'off-with-their-heads' routine, although I suppose Alice never actually lost her--"

" _Shut up,"_ Leo barely remembers moving, but all of a sudden he's standing over the Rat King, fists clenched and voice shaking. He tries to pour as much fury into his glare as possible, to ignore the sensation of a sword blade biting into his skin or blood running down his throat.

The Rat King gazes up at him blandly. "Or what? You couldn't kill me even if you had your swords, even if we were in the physical world. You learned that with Kitsune, remember? Very impressive showing, by the way. I don't think anyone's managed to startle her for a few millennia. But I..."

He rises, and Leo takes a reflexive step backward. "...I never worry about anticipating things, so _nothing_ surprises me."

Leo looks into those red eyes and uses every bit of his strength not to flinch. "Get out of my head."

"Such defiance. Do you think that Mummsy or Daddy Dearest will come to save you, if you only hold out long enough? You broke ties with the rat, remember? Or he threw you out--I'm still not quite sure how his reasoning worked, not that you are either." The Rat King picks up his cup and turns it around thoughtfully in his hand. "And Tang Shen will never waste her time protecting a dishonorable son."

He holds out the cup. "Would you like to read your fortune?" The leaves inside boil and hiss, even though there's no water left.

"Fuck you," Leo snarls, knocking the cup out his hand and smashing it against a wall. 

The Rat King clucks his tongue. "My sister was right; you _are_ a rude little beast. Well, I suppose there's nothing to be done about that. I'll need someone to clean up the mess, of course."

He snaps his fingers, and suddenly Leo's mother is there.

Only it's not his mother, because none of Leo's visions of his mother have shown her with her with a sword shoved into her chest, the blade sprouting from her back like the key in a wind-up doll. Blood stains her dress, trickling down her legs, while more blood pours steadily from her gaping mouth. Her gaze passes over him, eyes blank and dead. Leo thinks there might a maggot wriggling in one.

She crosses the room, moving stiffly, bones creaking and snapping. Bits of her skin fall over, forming a scattered white path in her wake. She brushes past him, and he almost vomits on the stench of rot. When she bends over to start picking up the pieces, her spine breaks with a thunderous _crack._

The whole time, she's humming an old Japanese lullaby. It's one Leo remembers, one he sometimes sings in his head while he's trying to fall asleep.

"Make it go away," Leo whispers. He's begging, he shouldn't beg, this isn't even _real,_ but he can _see_ and _hear_ and _smell_ her, it's that night she died and the rotting corpses of his brothers all over again.

"Pardon?"

"Make it go away, _please,_ make it stop, I'm _sorry..."_ The lullaby is getting louder, ringing through his bones, and Leo can't cover his ears, can't move, can't even turn his head or close his eyes.

"Oh, but don't you want to talk to your darling mother, Leonardo? She came all this way _just_ for you." Tang Shen straightens, and before Leo can pull himself together she places a hand on his face. It's cold, dead, crinkly like old paper-- _like Leo's skin was after he died._

On instinct, his hand shoots up and twists her wrist, only for it to _snap_ off in his hand. Leo drops it and throws up.

"Now, that's just poor form," says the Rat King, watching the vomit spill across the floor. There is blood and maggots in it, a sight that causes Leo to retch again.

"All right, this is getting gratuitous. I suppose we should get to the main event, before I run the risk of overdoing things and making myself look _tacky."_ The Rat King lets out a mock shudder as he snaps his fingers again and Tang Shen disintegrates, sending foul white dust blowing into Leo's face.

He coughs and splutters, frantically rubbing at his eyes. "M-main event?"

"You see, Kitsune and I _love_ one-upping each other, have since we were children." Suddenly, the Rat King puts his hands on Leo's chest and shoves him, sending him staggering shell-first into the door. "And nothing would give me greater satisfaction than making an obedient little knight out of a pet she couldn't train."

Leo blinks at him in confusion. "You--you're trying to brainwash me?"

"Brainwashing?" The Rat King chuckles. "That's more Kitsune's forte: poking at something's pressure points until they give. Whereas I..." The Rat King runs his fingers down Leo's chest, an oddly hungry look in his eyes. "...I prefer smashing my targets to bits and gluing them them back together in a different shape."

He shoves Leo again, and this time the door opens, spilling him into a bedroom.

It's nothing like any bedroom Leo's ever been in. The lights are turned down low, and there's a record in the corner playing a romantic song he thinks that he's heard on Donnie's radio. The bed is massive, taking up most of the floor space. And...there are pictures on the walls, pictures of people doing things that Leo is careful not to look at for too long.

He twists away and lunges for the door, but it's gone, replaced by a poster depicting a confusing tangle of flesh. The Rat King grabs him by the shell and hauls him backward, waving a finger in front of his face. "There'll be plenty of time to enjoy the art later, you dirty boy."

Leo smacks his hand away. "What is this?"

"I think you know." The Rat King traces a finger down Leo's cheek. "You may be exquisitely innocent, but you're not a fool."

Leo shakes his head wildly. "That's not--you don't--it doesn't make _sense_."

"Of course it does," says the Rat King. "Rape is the quickest, easiest way to break someone, even if Kitsune always considers herself too pure to use it. Besides," he pinches Leo's chin between two fingers, "you are a very pretty little dish, by my standards. I'm surprised your father never indulged."

Leo punches him in the throat, and it's like punching iron. He doesn't have time to scream in pain before the Rat King hits back, knocking the wind out of him and sending him flying onto the mattress.

Leo fights to scramble upright, fights to _breathe._ "This--isn't--real," he forces out, even though the nails scratching at his legs _feel_ real, so real.

"It's not," the Rat King agrees. "So instead of fucking your body, I'll be fucking your _soul,_ and probably tearing it apart from the inside out. Isn't that clever?"

Leo slams a fist into the side of his own head, to no avail. "Wake up, wake--" A deathly white hand smacks him across the face, sending his skull ringing.

"That's not going to wo-ork," the Rat King sing-songs, crawling onto the bed. "Not when I'm close to you, anyway. And I am _so_ close, my sweet knight. Can't you feel it?" He brushes a finger up against Leo's tail.

Leo screams, lashing out with every move he knows, but all his blows bounce off and the Rat King is so _strong,_ how is there so much power in that skeletal frame? He grabs Leo's wrists, grinding them painfully together, and forces his arms above his head.

"Why all the fighting?" the Rat King croons. "People usually don't mind when I sneak into their heads for a quick screw. Of course, I'm usually pretending to be someone they love--" His face warps into a gruesome parody of Raph's, then Splinter's, and Leo screams even louder.

"Fine, fine, not your type, I get it." The Rat King shifts back to himself and jams a brutal knee between Leo's legs, forcing them apart. Leo kicks as best he can, but the Rat King doesn't seem to notice and he can't close his legs again. He feels the skin on his wrists break under the Rat King's nails, blood running down his shaking arms. He can't meditate, can't control his breathing, can't control _anything._

"Stop," Leo begs, crying now because this was supposed to be _over,_ his head was supposed to be his _own,_ he was _free,_ and in the worst of Kitsune's fantasies he never felt as terrified as he does now. "Stop, I don't _want_ this, I don't--"

"Oh, hush." The Rat King starts petting his plastron, his touch viciously gentle. "I'm going to destroy you now, but there's no reason you can't lie back and enjoy. It's not like anyone _else_ is ever going to touch you, after all. Not the way that boys dream of being touched."

Sharp fingers dig into Leo's hips. "Deep down, there's a part of you that loves this, isn't there? I know all about the actors you've drooled after, all the naughty fantasies you have of being taken, claimed, _cherished_."

Leo lets out a sob, because he _has_ had dreams of being dominated like that, but... "Not like this. Never like this." He wanted it to be with someone he loved, someone who gave him a choice in the matter, and even if he knows that will probably never happen there's nothing that would make him want _this._

The Rat King bends low and plants a kiss on Leo's neck, his breath warm in his ear slit, "You might as well get used to it, little one. It's going to happen quite a bit." Leo twists, trying to bite him, but all he does is scrape his teeth painfully on the Rat King's unbreakable cheek.

"I'll kill you," he gasps out. "Stop it, or I'll kill you, I swear." He tries to spit, but it falls back on his own face.

"There's no need for theatrics," the Rat King says, hitting him again and filling Leo's mouth with blood. There's red staining his fingers as he reaches back between Leo's thighs, touching him, and Leo wants to _die._ "You're going to love this, soon enough."

He pulls something out of his coat, something hard and terrifying. "You'll be begging to have _this_ inside you."

" _Never,"_ Leo snarls, or tries to, but his voice trails off into a whimper as the Rat King presses himself up against Leo's tail, curled up protectively over his entrance. "Now, are you going to move this charming appendage, or will I have to tear it off?"

Leo whimpers, trying to grind himself deeper into the bed, trying to disappear. "Stop stop stop stop _stop--"_

"Just _relax_ ," says the Rat King, grip tightening painfully on the base of Leo's tail as he pries it away. "You're happiest with a Master to tell you what to do and what to think, to take the burden of leadership off your shoulders. And I promise to be the very best one you've ever--"

**"STOP."**

The mattress explodes into blue fire.

For a heartbeat, Leo and the Rat King gaze at each in mutual shock. Then the Rat King lets out a piercing scream and rolls off the bed. "You little _shit!"_ he howls, tearing off his coat and batting at his crackling flesh with bare hands.

Leo sits up, shaking. The fire licks his skin, but its touch is warm and welcoming.

It's _his,_ he realizes. The fire is his. And it comes not from will or self-control, but from the acidic cocktail of rage and humiliation and desperation and pure, crushing terror that is boiling in his veins. It's as if every emotion Leo ever locked away has suddenly been unleashed, translated into sky-colored flame.

The Rat King has stopped screaming now, staring at Leo in silence even as his own skin starts to blacken and fall away. "You..." he rasps, "You are something _different._ Different even among mutants, even among your brothers." His fingers are twitching, his jaw working as he tries to figure out what to do or say next.

Leo straightens his back and shifts into a lotus position, staring directly into the Rat King's eyes. He can hear the fire running up his shell, dancing across his head like a hood--or a crown. "Get the fuck out of my head," he says, dead calm.

The blue engulfs his vision, and then Leo's sitting up, covered in sweat and shaking all over. He's in a bedroom, his own bedroom. The Rat King is gone, and so is the fire.

Only...he can feel that fire, buried deep down in his heart. And Leo realizes that it's always been there, waiting for him to need it.

He also realizes that he's going to be violently sick.

He makes his way into the bathroom, moving quickly and quietly as possible, and is realized to see that his puke is blood-and-vomit free. Then he staggers into the shower and tears the water up to boiling hot, scrubbing the feel of the Rat King's hands off his body. He lets himself cry, trusting the water to drown out his sobs.

Afterwards, Leo checks the clock and finds that it's five in the morning, too early for his brothers to be up. He's not really in a mood to go back to sleep or meditate, so he practices in the main room instead, moving his swords slowly and gracefully through the air.

He looks at the winking blades, and wonders what they would look like covered in burning blue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leo is one of my favorite characters and I love hurting him. I'm not sure what that means.


	22. Vivisection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not meant to be an alternate ending to "Tokka Vs The World," despite appearances.

Mikey is floating. Well, sort of floating. They're these straps holding him down, keeping him from touching the pretty lights flickering on the ceiling. That's kind of annoying, but he supposes it's for the best 'cause he doesn't want to float away completely. Then he might get swept in the ceiling fans and spun round and round until they have get him down with a broom or something.

The idea makes him giggle. Or he tries to giggle, but there's something filling up his throat, silencing him. He's not scared, though. Why would he be? He's _floating,_ and nothing bad ever happens to people who can float. Superman taught him that.

He thinks there was a time before he was floating, a time of yelling and screaming and kicking, of lightning and nets and needles, a _lot_ of needles. Mikey doesn't like needles so much, but he likes these needles because they make him feel so nice. And they're so _shiny_ when they flash in the light!

The things that the humans are holding are shiny too, even though they aren't needles. And sometimes they hold up things that aren't shiny at all, red things Mikey can't focus too well on.

Their white coats flash as they work, and Mikey is riveted by the sight. They're so white and _clean,_ in a way that's impossible to keep things down in the sewers. He feels like he's lying in a snowbank, only it's all pretty white and no nasty cold.

Mikey smiles at the humans, because he's in a friendly mood and he likes to smile at people. He'd like to believe that they're smiling back, even though it's hard to tell through their masks.

It's so _quiet_ now, except for the scientists making an occasional comment about some mysterious "subject." It wasn't quiet earlier, back when they were using something shiny that buzzed and roared a whole lot. Then there was a funny little tingle in Mikey's tummy (a tingle that hasn't really stopped, now that he thinks about it) followed by a booming _crack_. He wanted to look and see what had broken, but none of the humans seemed too bothered.

Anyway, quiet. _So_ quiet that now he's getting kind of bored. But then one of the ceiling tiles moves aside and his brothers pour through in a bright shower of green, followed by April. Yeah! Now they can all be floaty together!

The humans jump away from Mikey with weird little squeals at the sight of his brothers, which Mikey thinks is kind of rude. I mean, his family might look a little unusual, but they're not that scary. In fact, what with their big colorful eyes and sweet smiles, Mikey secretly thinks they look kind of _cute._

Not that his family is smiling right now. Raph and Donnie both throw up for some reason, while Leo makes some kind of weird _shriek._ April lets out a piercing cry and raises her hands, sending the scientists flying like bowling pins.

Okay, that's just _weird_. Mikey grins brightly at his family, trying to calm them down. He wants to say _Relax, dudes,_ but his throat just pulses awkwardly around the thing running down it.

"Oh, Jesus," Raph believes, his voice sounding high and breathy in a way Mikey hasn't heard it since Splinter died. "They, they cut him _op--o_ h Christ, oh fuck, look what they _did_ to him..."

What did they do? Mikey tries to sit up and see, but there's things holding him down.

"No no no!" Donnie yells, running to his side. "Mikey, please don't move, just--just relax and we'll get you out of this." Mikey isn't sure what _this_ is, but Donnie is the family doctor, so he decides to relax and trust him.

Raph reaches for his throat and Donnie smacks his hand. "Don't--that tube might be the only thing keeping him breathing." Raph vomits again at the words, and Mikey's getting a little ticked off because that is _such_ a waste of good pizza. He tries to wriggle his eyebrows in chastisement.

Donnie's running his fingers along Mikey's neck, his touch whisper-light. "Injection sites," he explains as the others gather around them, taking the whitecoats' places. "He...they shot him up with something, so at least he's not in any pain."

"Oh, thank god," says April. She glances into the silver dishes surrounding Mikey and throws up, because that's apparently become a habit for everyone while he was gone.

Leo raises his palms. "Move aside, I need to do the mantra--"

"Not yet," Donnie, face paling to a sickly shade of green. "First I--I--I need to put the organs back in."

He starts yanking on a pair of plastic gloves, turning to yell at the scientists huddled in the corner. "Would any of you sadistic fucks mind telling me where you put the surgical thread before I start gouging your eyes out?" Someone apparently points, because Donnie dashes out of Mikey's line of vision.

"All right," says Leo, his voice shaking slightly. "April, guard the doors. I'll look after Mikey. Raph..." Raph has stopped retching and is walking past Mikey's table, fingers tapping on his sai. "Take your time."

He can hear the scientists' voices rise, hear them pleading and begging and pounding on the walls. Out of the corner of his eye, Mikey glimpses a few of them dashing for the door, only to be sent tumbling back by April's fists and powers.

He's not sure why they're freaking out so badly; Raph isn't _that_ boring.

Then Donnie's standing over Mikey again, picking up some shiny things and swallowing hard. Mikey squints, trying to figure out what's going on, wishing they would take the stupid thing in his throat out so he can just _ask._

"Don't look at him," Leo says, leaning into Mikey's line of vision. "Look at me, focus on me. Can you do that, sweetheart?" Leo almost _never_ calls them names like sweetheart, but Mikey loves it when he does that because it feels like something a mom would say.

There are tears glittering in Leo's big blue eyes and Mikey smiles some more, hoping that he won't feel so sad.

"I'm going to tell you a story, now," says Leo, his voice raised a little so that Mikey can hear it over the distant sound of screaming, sobbing, tearing flesh and snapping bones (did someone put on a movie?). "Beauty and the Beast. Would you like that?" Mikey would like that very much, so he starts to nod.

"No, don't nod. Just lie still and keep your eyes on me." Leo clears his throat and when he speaks again his voice is deep, dramatic, the Storyteller's Voice he usually only brings out when Mikey begs him to. "Once upon a time, there was a prince who lived in a castle. A wicked witch had put him under a terrible spell, turning him into a frightful beast..."

Mikey listens, riveted, as Leo tells the story, acting out all the voices and making all the faces. He likes Leo's version better than the movie, because in Leo's version there's never a suggestion that the Beast did something to _deserve_ being turned into a monster. In Leo's version, the pretty girl who comes to stay at the castle isn't a prisoner; she's a reporter, or an explorer, or a passing wanderer who got stuck because of a broken leg.

And in Leo's version of the story, the pretty girl breaks the spell by turning the Beast into something that isn't _scary_ , but isn't _normal_ either. Because you don't have to be normal for people to love you.

Or at least, that's how it's supposed to go. But this time, Leo has to break off before the end of the story, when the girl has left without realizing how much the Beast loves her. Mikey doesn't want him to go, especially since he's being replaced by _Raph_ of all people. Raph, who's looking significantly more red since Mikey saw him last. Like, red all over.

Mikey whines in protest, but Leo pats him on the head. "I'm sorry, sweetheart, but I have to go now. Raph will finish the story for you, okay?"

"I'll wha--"

"Just do it," Leo hisses through gritted teeth. Mikey would snicker if he could, because _o-oh,_ Raph's in _trou--ble_ _._ Not that that's not a regular occurrence, but it's still funny.

So Raph does, and Mikey finds himself enjoying it, even if Raph's _terrible_ with character effects and his Storyteller's Voice is just more of his own ragged growl. But none of that matters, because the girl comes _back_ to the Beast when he's about to die from heartbeat and saves him from the mob, restores him with true love's kiss.

As Raph talks, Mikey can hear Leo chanting in the background, over and over, accompanied by that soothing blue light. He feels things _creak_ and _shift_ around him, and feels oddly comforted by the sensation. He lets himself be lulled by his brother's voices, imagines them all drifting through the sky together.

Then Raph's saying, "They lived happily ever after," just as someone starts pounding on the laboratory door. Donnie carefully pulls the tube out of Mikey's throat while Raph's undoing the straps, before they both help him upright.

"Heeey, dudes," Mikey says, hands twitching in what he thinks might count as a suitable wave. "What's up?" His throat feels sore and raspy. _Do I have a cold?_ His tummy is still tingling, although the tingling feels...different. He's not sure how to describe it. 

He can see April standing in front of the door, weapons raised and eyes glowing faintly. Leo's propped up against the wall, talking on his T-Phone, and--wow, Leo does not look good at all. He's even paler than Donnie was, and he's shaking all over. There's blood pouring from his nose and ear slits, like the girl in _Stranger Things_ , along with more blood from his mouth and a little around his eyes.

"'S Leo a'right?" Mikey asks, clutching at Raph's shoulder so he doesn't float away. Raph's pissed enough about telling the story; Mikey _really_ doesn't want to see what'll happen if he has to rescue his youngest brother from the ceiling fan.

Raph's shoulder is also red, and the redness is _wet_. Did he spew ketchup all over himself or something?

"He's fine," says Donnie, stuffing a bunch of needles and bottles into his bag. "Just overextended himself a little with the mantra, that's all. He'll be better after a nice, long rest."

"The fuck are you doing with those?" Raph asks, pointing.

"Anesthesia and sedatives. He might need them later, plus they're just...good to have around." Donnie's not wearing the gloves anymore, but there's blood staining his wrists and his eyes look...weird. Distant, darting, like he's just been knocked off-kilter.

Mikey doesn't have long to think about that, because he's just been scooped up into Raph's arms. "I kin walk," he mutters. He can see Raph's green feet passing over the floor, which is...huh, a lot more red than Mikey remembers. Red like Raph's sais are red, which is _really_ red.

"No, you can't," Raph snaps, "so you might as well accept the free ride while you can, numbnuts." His voice is shaking as he says it, and so are his arms. Is there an earthquake going on?

The pounding is getting louder, combined with what Mikey thinks might be gunfire. Raph steps on the edge of a white coat, only now it's more of a _redcoat._ Hee hee. "The British are coming..." Mikey croons.

"We're not going to make it through the air ducts," Leo says. "Casey's waiting outside in the Shellraiser, and April's going to blow the wall so we can all jump out."

They all cluster behind April as raises her arms and closes her eyes. Donnie makes a grab for Leo, who tries to twist away, saying, "I don't need--"

"You may or may not have just given yourself a _brain_ _hemorrhage_ ," Donnie hisses. "You'd face plant if you jumped right now and we don't have time to argue about it." Leo sighs, but allows himself to be scooped up bridal-style, just like Mikey, who bursts into laughter at the sight.

"We look so _pretty!"_ he oohs, tapping a wedding march on Raph's red-streaked chest. "Heeere comes the bride, big, fat, and wide..." Raph doesn't smack him away, which is peculiar, but before Mikey can ask what's up with that April screams as the wall explodes.

Then they're sprinting, _flying_ into the bright outside light, and Mikey lets out a whoop as they spring into the air. And _then_ they're falling, down down down into the nice warm belly of the Shellraiser, like Alice down the rabbit hole.

"GO!" someone yells, and they're _squealing_ around corners while humans yell and shoot at them and it's so _exciting,_ almost as exciting as Beauty and the Beast. Mikey throws up from sheer excitement, and oddly no one seems to mind.

Eventually they leave the humans in the dust--of _course_ they do, it's the _Shellraiser--_ and vanish into the night. For a while they just drive in silence.

Casey speaks first, glancing at Leo in the rearview mirror. "What's with the new look, Eleven?" His words are flippant, but his face is drawn and pale.

"I _know,_ right?" Mikey says, watching Leo scrub at his bloody face with fascination. Meanwhile, April has flopped down on the Shellraiser floor, looking totally exhausted as her hair slips out of its ponytail.

"Mantra took a lot out of him," Donnie mutters, although Mikey can't see him too well because Raph's still holding him in a death grip, which is yet _another_ weird part of today.

Casey's eyes shift to Mikey's plastron. "Is that a _crack?"_

"Shut up, Case," Raph growls, but Mikey's already looking down. There _is a_ crack, a long shallow one running down the middle of his chest. There are a few other, smaller ones scattered around it. He tries to poke it at, but Raph gently tugs his hands away.

"Donnie?" Mikey asks, because Donnie is always the person to go to for these things. "My tummy looks funny." He lets out a burst of laughter at the unintentional rhyme.

"I'll fix it," Leo promises, tossing a dirty pink cloth to the side. "I...I just need to rest, recharge, and I can fix it." He's not looking at Donnie, so he doesn't see the flicker of doubt crossing Donnie's face.

"It _feels_ funny, too," Mikey muses, chewing his lip thoughtfully. "I..." he swallows, "I don't feel as floaty anymore, Donnie. I feel _weird._ I don't think I _like_ it."

"I know, sweetie," Leo says. There's a prick in Mikey's shoulder, quick and without warning, the way he likes his needles. "Donnie just gave you something for the pain, okay?"

"But--I don't have any pain," Mikey mumbles. He glances out the window, at the lights flashing by in the dark. "We...we're goin' home?"

"Always," Leo promises, as his brothers curl up around him.

"And you'll tell the story for me? Not Raph? He always messes it up." Raph doesn't growl at that, but Mikey's suddenly too sleepy to care about all this oddness.

"Of course," says Leo, as Mikey's brothers curl up around him. "Now close your eyes, dear heart. We'll take care of everything. We'll take care of you."

"M'kay," says Mikey, even though he already _knows_ his brothers will take care of him, so Leo doesn't really have to say it. He lets his eyes slip closed, feels oblivion claim him.

For the last time in a long while, he has no nightmares.


	23. Whispers

They all talked to Leo during his coma. Raph did it the most, of course, but on the few occasions he was gone there was usually someone slipping in after him. Their words were broken into fractured whispers at the edge of Leo's battered consciousness, fading in and out like static.

April told him about the weird things his brothers had been doing lately, or wished that he was awake to help her handle Donnie's obsessions and Raph's moods. She kept him up-to-date on the scattered bits of information they had gathered about New York City, assuring him that no permanent damage was being done to the city's inhabitants while he was asleep.

Sometimes, talking about New York reduced her to tears about her dad, and she had to scramble out of the bathroom. Even if Leo couldn't hear her, she didn't feel comfortable breaking down in his presence.

Other times, she'd quietly weep about Irma, apologizing over and over again for bringing her to the lair and getting Leo separated from the family. "I think I loved her," she admitted one time, when she was a little drunk on her dad's old beer. "Or...something, I don't know. But I believed that she would understand and...and when I saw what she was, my heart felt like it had been dunked in acid. Not that that makes up for what I did to you."

Casey only came once in a while, usually for an awkward "Hey, man." He'd joke about whether the government would bomb New York rather than let aliens rule it, joke in the style of someone who is kept awake some nights by the blood-chilling possibility of such a thing.

A few times he playing loud music in hopes of stimulating Leo's brain (he played a lot of Lady Gaga on the reasoning that "it worked for Barry Allen"). Donnie saw the logic, but Raph would always get fed up eventually and make him stop. He knew that Leo _hated_ blasting music; they'd had far too many arguments about it at home.

Mikey would pop in to chatter about his day, about the animals he'd encountered or the flowers he'd seen, the DVDs he'd binge-watched and the pranks he'd played. Sometimes he would break down in tears, not caring if his brothers could see. Raph was usually left with the awkward job of comforting him, a tasking that had always belonged to Leo or Splinter. He did his best.

If Leo was alone, Mikey would come sing. He sang pop songs, commercial jingles, lullabies that Leo had sung to him. His voice was raw and untrained, but had a crystalline beauty. Sometimes the others would gather around the bathroom door to listen. They never mentioned the impromptu concerts to Mikey, for fear that he would stop.

When Raph was there Donnie went on about the progress he'd been making on Leo's case. He discussed available resources, potentially effective technologies, his progress with various experiments. Usually he and Raph ended up fighting about the best path to take: "Fuck ya, Meredith Gray, no one's putting prosthetics in anybody!"

When Raph wasn't there, Donnie would usually quietly sob. He told Leo how terrifying it was to be leader, asked if Leo had felt as anxious and paranoid as Donnie did these days. He confessed how little faith he sometimes had in his own medical abilities, because _he was an engineer, not a doctor, dammit._

"Don't die," he begged. "Please don't die, it'll destroy us if you die. I think...I think I might hurt myself, if you die, if I don't save you." Then he smacked himself on the head, because _fuck_ , he shouldn't have admitted that, what was he _thinking_ , someone could have heard, and even if no one had he couldn't burden Leo's subconscious with such things, and rushed out of the bathroom.

Most of the time, though, it was just Raph and Leo. One turtle crammed awkwardly into a chair, the other tucked away into a bathtub, and only Raph's voice to fill the endless silence.

Raph read to him from _Alice in Wonderland_ , only to give up partway through because "the writer's fuckin' nuts and I don't wanna read about some crazy human chick trippin' balls." He switched to _Wonder_ by R.J. Palacio, an experience that reduced him to sniffles more times than he would care to count.

"Little shit didn't know how lucky he had it," he said, frantically scrubbing the tears out of his eyes. "I woulda _killed_ for a space helmet growin' up."

But sometimes Raph would find himself tossing the book aside and breaking out into a snarl: "What the fucking fuck were you _thinking,_ you stupid piece of shit?! Running off like that, it's a miracle we ever saw ya again!"

He'd rant until he was hoarse, wishing with every particle of his soul that Leo would just _wake_ _up_ and tell him what an asshole he was being. He'd bounce his fists on his thighs, fighting the urge to smack the tub, terrified of hurting his brother.

And eventually, he would find himself saying, "We should have been with ya. We shouldn't have run off like a bunch of cowards. We should have...we should have... _fuck."_

On the very worst nights, he'd whisper, "It shoulda been me."

"I'm the hothead," he reminded Leo, once. "I'm the screwup, I'm the guy who ticks everyone off and kicks ass in a fight. I'm supposed to be the tough one, the _protector._ I was the one who should have left. You're the leader. We actually _need_ ya, we don't need me. It, it should be me in the tub. You should be _awake,_ running around makin' a super-dramatic plan that ya stole from _Space Heroes_ to _fix_ all this.

"No one even _thought_ of making me leader, you know? It went straight to Donnie, even though he's supposed to be _younger_ than me. I'm the dumb one, the crazy one, the _mean_ one that everybody only likes because he can take a punch. I'm the one runnin' into the fire...until I actually have to _back_ up all my big talk, and I don't, and you have to sacrifice yourself instead.

"After you almost died in the Technodrome, I swore to myself that it would never happen again, not _ever._ And, well...I fucked that up good, didn't I? I shoulda just whacked ya over the head and threw ya over my shoulder when you tried to lead the Kraang away.

"I mean, what happens if you wake up and get better, and then a week or a month or a year down the line we're in danger again _?_ Are you gonna threw yourself over the edge again, Leo? Are you going to leave us _again?_ What if you don't come back next time, huh? What the fuck am I supposed to do about that?

"I have nightmares about comin' in here one day and you're just not breathin,' and the ground just splits open under me because what do I _then?_ There's no Leo without Raph, there's no Raph without Leo. We fight all the time because if we didn't we'd tear _ourselves_ apart. Is that what I'm gonna haveta do?"

He was sobbing now, sobbing so hard he could barely breathe. "Come back. Just--just please come back. I don't even believe in God and I'm prayin' for you to come back every fuckin' night. Just _come_ back, Leo. Stop bein' a stubborn fucking asshole and open your eyes already. If, if you're mad about all the times I've fucked up I'm _sorry_ , okay? We're all sorry. We'll do better this time. Just...please come back."

Eventually, Raph slipped to the floor and curled up on the cool tile, crying himself to sleep.

When Leo woke up, everyone was overjoyed. And everyone also found themselves hoping, with various degrees of intensity, that he didn't remember anything he'd overheard during his coma. For the most part, it seemed that he didn't.

But one night he hobbled into Raph's room and slipped into his bed, throwing his arms around him. And Raph found himself hugging back.

"I love you," Leo whispered into his ear. "I forgive you. You have nothing to hate yourself for." Raph said nothing, just leaned into Leo's chest and tried to believe him.

They spent the rest of the night folded up together, taking deep breaths of each other's intactness and _aliveness_. They didn't trade any more whispers; they didn't have to.


	24. Xenocide

The aliens are here, and the sky is falling, and April O'Neil's world is crashing down around her.

She stands on a chilly street with her friends, three of the four turtles who have turned her life upside down and changed it for the better. The fourth lies in the back of the Shellraiser, unconscious, maybe dying.

The monster that haunts April's dreams looms over them, the very creature that _created_ April as a weapons to destroy worlds. In a truly sick way, Kraang-Prime is as much April's parents as the mother who is dead or the father who has been driven into mutated insanity (again).

It's also the creator of Irma Langstein, the strange, sweet girl who has very recently broken April's heart. And an ally of the Shredder, the demon in human skin who nearly beat Leo to death and threw Master Splinter into the dark. _And_ the leader of the forces that intends to wipe the human race from the earth.

April has a lot of hate for this creature, more hate than she ever imagined possible. It boils in her veins, bubbles in her skull, makes the world flicker an ugly red.

And she hates Kraang-Prime all the more because she has a _connection_ to it. She can feel its hive mind poking at the edge of hers; has for a long while, really ever since they first strapped her down to their brutal steel examination tables. Usually she can push it away, even forget about it.

But not now, not when the city is crawling with her unholy brethren. Their mad chatter has been growing louder and louder, with disaster after disaster, and she can no longer summon the strength to push it away.

So instead, as Kraang-Prime looms over them, delivering one final ridiculous monologue, April closes her eyes and _reaches._

She sends invisible fingers into its head, and from there she sends her will spiraling across the city, leaping from Kraang-brain to Kraang-brain. April staggers, gasping, because she can feel _everything_ , buzzing through her nerve endings. It's an endless building shrieking devouring current of _noise_ , almost enough enough to drown her.

But then she grits her own teeth and throws her own will back.

She sends fifteen years of fear, confusion, anger, humiliation, grief, loss, rage--especially what she's collected in the past two years, and the past two years--racing across the web. She pumps a power made from pure, concentrated _hate_ into the beings that are her forefathers, her pursuers, her tormentors...but not her masters. _Never_ her masters.

April screams, rising up off the concrete as her hair snap free of its ponytail and glass shatters in nearby windows. There's a wetness on her face as blood pours out of her nose. She can see Kraang-Prime lurching to a confused halt, hear the panicked shouts of her friends. She doesn't have time to care.

She reaches deep inside herself, drawing upon the deep wells of power that were buried inside her, that were once meant to be turned against a planet. She used to be scared of this power, an idea that now seems ridiculous because how can you be scared of anything when you're on the verge of losing everything?

Her sheer, impossible _force_ tears through the Kraang-mind, engulfing every synapses in a fierce bright storm of emotion. She can feel them start to break and burn under the pressure, screams both in triumph and in reflected agony.

 _What...._ the Kraang-Prime gasps, a voice that is meant to be a snarl coming off as a weak whimper in April's mental hurricane. .... _do you think you are doing, you stupid little bitch?_

 _Can't you tell?_ April replies, as the concrete beneath her starts to crack from sheer psychic blowback. _I'm writing you out of the narrative._

From up here, in her elevated headspace, she can see the glowing web that is the Kraang hive-mind. It's like a net of electric cables, a pristine machine with every wire perfectly in place. It hums merrily to itself as it spreads, smothering her city.

So April throws her last bit of power at it, and pulls the plug.

The darkness explodes like a tidal wave, tearing fast fast fast. It is more than a storm, it is an _apocalypse._ April howls, and whether the sound is the war cry of a god or the mad shriek of a demon she really isn't sure.

They all die. Every one. The machines crash to their knees as the brains die sputtering deaths, their last few psychic squeals drifting off into the ether.

In the end, it's just Kraang-Prime, his incredible frame shaking from horror and grief and the full weight of April's strength. _You...you can't,_ he whispers. _We_ made _you._

 _I know_ , April says, her voice somehow acting as a whisper and a scream at the same time. _Goodbye, Irma._.

Kraang-Prime topples to earth slowly, and not without a bit of grace, letting out a soft _clatter_ as he curls up in a heap. April releases a sigh of exhaustion and drifts back to the street, barely noticing when she's snatched up in Donnie arms.

When April O'Neil opens her eyes, she is the last daughter of her race.

"Oh, God..." Donnie whispers, frantically scrubbing at her face. She's bleeding from her nose, not to mention her ears and eyes and mouth. It won't kill, though. She's not sure anything can, not now.

"April," Mikey says, his young voice sounding so taut and small and full of terror. "April, what did you _do?"_

 _The necessary thing. The worst thing. The only option. The cruelest option. Saved a species. Destroyed a species._ None of that seems to fit in her mouth, so she finds herself murmuring a word she learned in English class: "Xenocide."

Donnie's green face goes white, but the other two just gape in confusion. "Xeno--what?" Raph asks.

"Xenocide," Donnie breathes. As April drifts off, she hears him explain to the others: "It means the total destruction of another species."

"Do you regret it?" Donnie asks her, a few days later.

They're standing in the lab, picking through freshly scavenged Kraang tech to see if there's anything to help Leo heal. Raph and Mikey are searching the sewers for Splinter and Karai, while Casey is off looking for April's dad. April wanted to try and find them telepathically, but Donnie's forbidden her from using her powers until she has a bit more time to recover.

(And April maybe doesn't want to find out quite yet what her father and Splinter will think of what she's done, what she's become. Although she suspects Karai will be very impressed).

"I had to do it," April replies, staring at Leo as he sleeps on the lab cot so she won't have to meet Donnie's eyes. "But still...I don't know. I go back and forth on it, most nights. Sometimes I can sleep and sometimes I can't."

"You looked beautiful up there," Donnie says quietly, also staring at Leo. He blushes, rubbing the back of his neck. "I mean...it was just amazing. Like nothing I've ever seen."

"Thank you," April says. Donnie seems to be having the best time coping with what she did. Raph and Casey both still seem a little shocked, and there are times when Mikey seems outright terrified of her.

She hopes that they'll come around eventually. And if not, well...maybe that's the price she has to pay.

Although they don't know what happened to Leo, April suspects that whoever he'll be when he wakes up won't be the same as who he was before. And she thinks that his new self will find it easier to understand the issue of murderous hate.

As Donnie examines a particularly hopeful piece of tech, she watches the impossibly graceful movements of his hands. They're mutant hands, she thinks. Inhuman hands, maybe even monstrous hands. Hands that are going through the spoils of her bloody victory without even flinching.

Hands, April realizes, that are a lot like hers.

She takes one of those hands and squeezes it in her own, enjoying how solid it is, how grounding compared to the unreality of the psychic plane. "And thank you for not being afraid of me," she says.

Donnie looks up at her, red-brown eyes bright. "I'd never be afraid of you, April," he says, and she knows he's telling the truth about her. After all, what she did was the most purely _logical_ option, the one he would have taken if he'd been in her place.

Perhaps, April thinks as they lean into a kiss, they're not so different as she once thought.


	25. You

Of all his brothers, Leo is the one with the clearest memories of his own body, the one that was brutally cut apart, the one he had for an entire lifetime compared to the few years he's been a turtle. So of all his brothers, he's the one who most often who finds himself looking into the mirror and thinking, _I'm not supposed to look like this._

He'll pass his hand over his torso and feel bereft by the lack of nipples, of pale white flesh. He'll touch his face and think that this is not _his_ jaw, _his_ jaw is meant to look a lot more like his father's. He'll look between his legs and feel slightly nauseous.

And then he'll look back in the mirror and think, _What the hell are_ you _supposed to be?_

He doesn't know anyone who he can really share the experience with, until he finds Jenny sobbing on the bathroom floor because she _can't breathe_ in her shell. Leo doesn't know what to do, doesn't know whether to touch her or not, so he just sits next to her and breaths, slow and easy to follow, until she comes back to him.

"Donnie calls it body dysmorphia," Leo says afterwards, as they sit on the farmhouse porch and drink cups of tea (Jennika may have spiked hers with bourbon, but Leo pretends not to notice). "The skin you're wearing just doesn't feel...right. It's not as bad for us as it gets for some people, but there isn't really a cure."

"I miss my boobs," Jenny admits, studying her tea thoughtfully. "I can't believe it, really--do you know how much I got catcalled because of those damn things? But they were _mine,_ and I spent _years_ learning how to protect them, and, well..." She studies her very flat chest. "It's like I'm not really a girl anymore, even though I _feel_ like one, and there's no hormone therapy in the cosmos that can fix...this." She pokes her plastron gingerly, then sighs. "God, I sound so stupid."

"I miss my hair," Leo says, before he can stop himself.

Jennika blinks at him. "Really?"

"Yeah," Leo rubs his bald head, trying not to blush. "I had really nice, long black hair. I was pretty vain about taking care of it, not that I made a big deal about it where my family could see." He smiles fondly at the memory. "My parents and I, they both had hair like that..." He trails off, smile fading.

"I miss having warm blood," Jenny says quietly. "I get so _cold_ sometimes, and I feel so _weird_ under that basking lamp."

Leo nods, because he misses being a mammal, too. He misses a lot of things.

He misses being able to smile at a pretty girl in the market and have her smile back instead of screaming. He misses the days when he didn't have to battle bursts of frustration while forcing his clumsy fingers to write kanji. He misses the nights where he didn't have to sleep in a shell that sometimes feels like armor and sometimes feels like a vise.

But he doesn't miss being dead. And he doubts that Jenny misses the sensation of dying.

"These bodies are second chances," he points out, rubbing the green muscles of his arm. His body is covered in muscles that he developed in one lifetime and honed to perfection in this one. "We're lucky to have them, even if they suck sometime."

"Yeah," Jenny says, gazing out at the sunset.

There's a clatter behind them, and Leo picks up his cup. "Come on," he says, rising to his feet. "Let's go see what Italian monstrosity Mikey put together tonight."

Jenny follows him inside; their feet are silent as they walk, almost unconsciously so. These aren't the feet they were born with, but Leo and Jenny can still move them with the grace of true ninja.

Their new bodies may be foreign instruments, but that doesn't mean they can't be brought under control.


	26. Zoo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue to "Spoils."

Leo's tracker leads Raph to the zoo.

He picks his way through the midnight shadows, dodging the hungry eyes of security cameras. Animals watch him sleepily through the bars of their prison, eyes flickering. They don't growl; they're accustomed to strangers, even ones at odd hours.

Some of the animals look like mutants he'd known. A few look like mutants he'd killed.

He makes his way to the reptile house, shivering as he stepped into the cooler, darker space. Leo is sitting crosslegged on the cold stone floor in front of a recently emptied case, playing with several small turtles. He's talking to them softly as they moved in circles around him, their little green heads bobbing.

Raph sighs. He hates being the one on "rescue detail," having to go out and track down a missing sibling who has lost themselves. But Donnie has barricaded himself in his lab again, and Mikey had buried himself under a pile of stolen stuffed animals with his new kitten, headphones blaring.

"Do you ever miss it?" Leo asks as Raph approached, running his finger along a turtle's shell. "Not having to think, not having to worry about the future or remember the past? Being normal?"

"Dunno," Raph says. He's never really though that much about being an ordinary turtle, but then again, he's never experienced Leo's headspace during these "episodes." When Raph topples over the edge, he usually just goes to beat up criminals and often has to be bodily hauled home, to receive comfort in a pair of soothing green arms.

Not having to remember, though...he gets that. He gets that really good.

He sits down at his brother's side, and for a few seconds they just watch the turtles crawl. He doesn't touch Leo, not wanting to spook him. When Leo gets like this, every form of physical contact reminds him of the things Shredder and Karai did. The things that the brothers had to do to each other.

The shadows on Leo's skin look like bruises.

 _Hurt him,_ Saki said, once. _Make him squeal, make him shriek, make him_ mean it, _or I'll fuck the little one with a knife._ So Raph did as he was told, tore his brother apart with fists and teeth and cock, somehow managing to grab the lock pick from Leo in the middle of it all. Afterwards, Leo whispered _I forgive you_ through bloody lips, and Raph would have actually killed himself if he'd been free.

"Five months," Leo says, cutting Raph out of his ugly thoughts. "An anniversary." Ah, yes. Five months in Saki's captivity, five months trying to put themselves together in the aftermath, when everyone they'd ever loved was dead and there were no more dragons to slay.

Only they hadn't been Saki's pets for five months, not really. They'd been in those chains for a year, a decade, a lifetime, a thousand centuries, a literal eternity. Raph had died in those chains more times than he could count.

"He said something about doing special when we reached six months," Leo continues. "I though, what could he possibly do? And I knew that there would always be something new, something that we could never possible imagine." He brushes a finger over the scars on his shoulders, where they cut Saki's name and insignia off their bodies after they got to the dusty wreck of home, before they'd even washed off the blood.

"I don't remember that," Raph tells him, not knowing what else to say. He picks up a turtle and peers down into its dull black eyes, before setting it down to crawl free.

"It happened after a threesome with Karai," Leo says simply. Raph starts; his brother had never mentioned this before. "She didn't want to do it either, but...well, he was bored, wanted to put her in her place. So one time after he brought me to her room he just followed me in. He mentioned it afterwards, when we all lying there. Karai was trying not to cry. I think she had though she was safe, now that he had us to keep the attention off of her.

"When I cut off her head, well...we didn't have time to talk, but I think she understood. I could see it in her eyes. Not like she forgave me, not like she wanted it or anything, not like she wouldn't have killed us for her father, but she...understood. She'd raped me, her father had raped us, so this made sense. I don't think Saki understood." Leo sighs. "A world where he didn't win just didn't compute with him."

He twirls something between his fingers, something bloody and green. A lock pick, Raph realizes; he glances at Leo's body and realizes that there are bloody patches where he's been picking at his scales again.

"You don't have to make those things anymore," Raph reminds him. "You're free."

"Am I?" Leo asks, looking at him for the first time. His eyes are so sad, so tired, so _empty._

 _"Yes,"_ Raph says firmly. "Our heads may be fucked, but no one can tell us what to do with our bodies anymore. We're _out_ of the chains, Leo, even if we can still feel them. We can go wherever we want, _do_ whatever we want. We can _rebuild,_ make new lives out of the ashes or whatever, and if anyone tries to stop us we can slice 'em up too."

He jerks to a stop, startled by that little speech. Leo blinks at him. His eyes are still sad and tired, but they're not quite as empty.

Raph remembers the way Leo had looked at him as he popped the first lock on his chains, prepared to step free and _finally_ pull Saki off of Mikey. A Leader's Look, proud and fierce, promising that everything will be okay. Saki crushed so much in his brother, but he couldn't crush that. Same with Raph's fire, and Donnie's brilliance, and Mikey's appreciation for the soft and sweet parts of life. And where those things remain, others might return.

He leans forward, looking into his brother's eyes, close enough for them to kiss if they wanted to--which they don't, not right now.And that _choice_ is such a precious thing. _I love you,_ Raph says, using the strange, inhuman speech that's always been buried in their heads, the one that saved them during their captivity.

 _I love you,_ Leo replies in the same language. A language that is _theirs_ , no one else, just as they belong to no one.

Leo tosses the lock pick aside and slowly rises to his feet, stretching his arms over his head. "We gotta put the turtles back," Raph reminds him.

His brother raises an eye ridge. "Into their cage?"

"No," Raph says, picking the two closest ones up. "We gotta take them _home."_

Leo sighs, but does as he's told. He follows Raph out of the reptile house, out of the zoo, out of the desolate and broken space at the back of his head (for now, at least).

They sprint through the night together, feet in perfect step, discussing which movie they'll put on when they get home and how they'll convince the others to watch with them. Their limbs flicker through the dark: strong, scarred, swift, unbound and unbroken.


End file.
